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Post by Rory on Jun 22, 2017 17:57:12 GMT
I was at today's matinee and really enjoyed it. I thought Andrew Scott was sensational. Every bit of his delivery and movement rang true for me. Some of the usual Icke-isms present in the overall production but I suppose if it ain't broke, don't try fixing it.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 22, 2017 18:37:51 GMT
Saw the matinee today as well and having previously seen it at th almeida it still os very good and not much has changed except a few minor cast changes and the staging being slightly different. I also enjoyed it more than at the almeida for some reason and am slightly tempted for a 3rd visit. All the cast are very good and it is a great production. Also the Almeida have realised a playlist of all the songs featured open.spotify.com/embed/user/almeidatheatre/playlist/0PsP0YqMon749APMLsLjhF |
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Post by Rory on Jun 22, 2017 18:43:55 GMT
Saw the matinee today as well and having previously seen it at th almeida it still os very good and not much has changed except a few minor cast changes and the staging being slightly different. I also enjoyed it more than at the almeida for some reason and am slightly tempted for a 3rd visit. All the cast are very good and it is a great production. Also the Almeida have realised a playlist of all the songs featured open.spotify.com/embed/user/almeidatheatre/playlist/0PsP0YqMon749APMLsLjhFWhere were you sitting Rob? I was in Row D of the stalls which was actually the second row for this. Was good during the Players / Mousetrap scene. |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 22, 2017 18:44:11 GMT
and not much has changed except the ticket prices have doubled. |
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Post by Rory on Jun 25, 2017 11:32:33 GMT
There was a profile of this production and an interview with Andrew Scott on the Andrew Marr show this morning.
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Post by crowblack on Jun 25, 2017 11:35:55 GMT
Ooh, I'll watch that then. Andrew Scott was on the One Show a couple of weeks ago too.
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Post by Steffi on Jun 28, 2017 6:13:58 GMT
I might have a spare ticket for this for the 1.30pm matinee on July 8th. One of the £25 pillar seats in the stalls.
Should know by tomorrow so in case anyone would be interested let me know. :-)
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Post by firefingers on Jul 6, 2017 0:27:00 GMT
After a week of tying my luck at the Today Tix lottery I finally bagged a ticket and what a ticket. C12, which is essentially middle of the front row. Spoilers below but long story short, great production. {Spoiler - click to view}
C12 is possibly the best seat in the house, as the players scene is done with the majority of the cast taking seats quickly placed in front of row C, meaning 2 foot in front to the left was Andrew Scott and 2 foot in front to the right was Angus Wright squirming at the action. This also meant my mug was plastered on the screens in the back ground, as this and several other scenes uses cameras to show action up close (what is this thing that has started happening, this then Bat Out Of Hell?)
I adored how Andrew Scott seemed to be coming up with the lines from within, not from a script but from inside his own head like it was a long adlib. He made it seem to very natural. Angus Wright was odd... I sort of got what he was doing, a very clean and non-panto villain-esq Claudius but it made it slightly awkward in places. I thought Jessica Brown Findley actually created an Ophelia who wasn't a damp squib and her descent and suicide didn't jar like they normally do.
Enjoyed the additional scene and thought it fit seamlessly.
I agree it should end with Hamlet's death, no one cares about Horatio and Fortinbras by this point, though I did enjoy thinking about the watches and their meaning.
-puts on resident board member sound design hat-
My only problem was the sound. Dialogue was rather quiet even though it was all radio mic'ed, though I was front row so not a problem but wouldn't have wanted to be in a back corner. But the main thing is, it being a Tom Gibbons show, sound effects after smashed into your ears at every scene change making the dialogue afterwards that much harder to hear as your ear readjusts. This harshness worked well in 1984 but I think it jarred a lot with this production. Horses for courses and your millage might vary, but not for me.
Now Hamlet isn't one of my favourite Shakespeares', but this this is a rather cracking production of it. 4 1/2 stars. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2017 7:14:24 GMT
what is this thing that has started happening I'm pretty sure we can blame Ivo van Hove for this one, though tbh it's not an unheard of theatrical device, it's just REALLY gathered steam the last few years. |
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Post by callum on Jul 6, 2017 7:37:53 GMT
I've just remembered the back screens in Van Hove's OBSESSION and burst out laughing to myself all over again.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2017 10:59:05 GMT
what is this thing that has started happening I'm pretty sure we can blame Ivo van Hove for this one, though tbh it's not an unheard of theatrical device, it's just REALLY gathered steam the last few years. The technology wasn't really there until recently. Given the multiplicity of ways we use screens to watch and the bleed of narrative language between different media, they are here to stay In a post a while ago that asked about how theatre might develop, I said that projection will become more all enveloping to the extent that they stop being screens and just become the whole environment. |
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Post by barrowside on Jul 7, 2017 12:08:39 GMT
How is Derbhle Crotty's Gertrude?
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Post by mallardo on Jul 8, 2017 7:58:20 GMT
How is Derbhle Crotty's Gertrude?
She's excellent. Very sexy and a good match for Angus Wright - they had palpable chemistry. Plus her Irish accent linked her to Andrew Scott and, to a degree, separated the two of them from the rest of the court in a way that underlined the closeness of their relationship heretofore.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 8, 2017 18:31:52 GMT
Spotted on ATG that a performance was filmed either last week or the week before. No confirmations of cinema screenings or even a DVD release, so most probably for archive purposes.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 10, 2017 7:58:46 GMT
I've nothing constructive to add except mallardo has reminded me that Angus Wright is in this and I'm now looking forward to looking at him for 4 hours in August  I'm nothing if not an equal opps theatre oggler |
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Post by bordeaux on Jul 14, 2017 9:47:56 GMT
Saw this yesterday afternoon and loved it and him. I've seen it 16 times, I think, though this is only the third time this century, but it all felt very fresh and there was quite a lot I didn't recognise - has Icke restored rarely performed bits from wherever it is directors find rarely performed bits of Shakespeare? The screens, the TV footage all worked superbly and Scott was very good - perhaps a little weepy on occasion for me - with the soliloquys wonderfully conversational. I am ambivalent about the use of the Bob Dylan songs (as I am about the use of, say, Blue by Joni Mitchell in the Ivo van Hove Hedda). If you don't know the songs, they mean very little and there is the danger of banality. One of the very best productions I've seen - and it's a play I've been lucky with over 30 years: best would be Dillane/Peter Hall, Branagh/Noble and Rylance/Daniels; worst - Daniel Webb lost in a Lyubimov concept with a massive curtain on stage at the Old Vic/Rickman for Robert Sturua and Cumberbatch for Lyndsey Turner, the first two clear examples of great foreign directors failing to get hold of Shakespeare's text in a language not their own.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 15, 2017 22:50:03 GMT
Was at the matinee on Thursday and thought it was thoroughly superb. I'd not seen Hamlet performed live and had only seen the David Tennant RSC production on DVD. You could have heard a pin drop during Scott's soliloquies and I loved how he injected elements of comedy to lighten up the doom and gloom; his interaction with the ghost was heartbreaking as well as incredibly intense. I'd also highly recommend trying for the Rush tickets on TodayTix - front row, this show is an experience.
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Post by sherriebythesea on Jul 17, 2017 23:23:13 GMT
Saw this evening and it was wonderful. The screens worked so well with the story. I was cheering with tears running down my face at the end. Surprised by a few of the minor characters, they were standing like they didn't know what to do with their arms and legs when other characters were speaking.
I laughed a bit and swallowed the wrong way and started to cough. I was trying desperately to control it when an angel of a man behind me handed me his bottle of water. Saved my pride. Was so embarrassed. Hopefully I won't read about myself in the bad behavior topic.
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Post by bordeaux on Jul 18, 2017 12:20:10 GMT
Can thoroughly recommend the £25 Royal Circle seats 'with a pillar in line of sight'. The pillar really didn't get in my way and you're within touching distance of people who've paid £90. Reasonable availability throughout August, it would appear.
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Post by Kim_Bahorel on Jul 18, 2017 19:01:40 GMT
Are there understudies in this now it's in the West End? I haven't been to see it and curious as to who they are (if there are any.)
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Post by bordeaux on Jul 18, 2017 22:05:58 GMT
Are there understudies in this now it's in the West End? I haven't been to see it and curious as to who they are (if there are any.) I'm not sure what you mean by 'understudies'. The same cast performs all performances, I assume. If someone were ill, an understudy would take over, but only then. There may have been one or two recastings from when it was on at the Almeida, chiefly Derbhle Crotty replacing Juliet Stevenson, but I doubt they have a policy, which some musicals have, of letting major roles have an afternoon off. I saw a Thursday matinee and all the cast were present and correct. |
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Post by princeton on Jul 18, 2017 22:25:52 GMT
Yes - there are four understudies now: Mark Desebrock Andy Hawthorne Penelope McGhie Nneka Okoye Listed (and bios) on the Almeida website almeida.co.uk/whats-on/hamlet-west-end/9-jun-2017-2-sep-2017Though it doesn't say which parts they are covering - and there may well also be some understudying from other members of the cast. |
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Post by mallardo on Jul 18, 2017 23:20:08 GMT
The understudy Hamlet is, appropriately, Horatio - Joshua Higgott
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Post by RedRose on Jul 20, 2017 8:55:37 GMT
Great interview of Scott by Simon Mayo on BBC 2 Drivetime on Tuesday.
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Post by TallPaul on Jul 20, 2017 12:45:58 GMT
Great interview of Scott by Simon Mayo on BBC 2 Drivetime on Tuesday. I agree. Simon asked Andrew Scott if he would be taking it to Broadway. He didn't reply, which Simon took to mean that yes, he would. |
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