From the wrestling of his own soul with the great enemy, comes that depth and mystery which startles us in Hamlet.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Hamlet is a little daunting.
Hamlet is an astonishing intelligence.
If you were to ask everyone what 'Hamlet' was about, they might say, "It's about a prince, and he says, 'To be or not to be.'"
If you look at a painting that you love by one of the great masters, every time you go back to it, you see something different - a different attitude or brushstroke. 'Hamlet' is like an entire gallery of old masters.
'Hamlet' is one of the most dangerous things ever set down on paper. All the big, unknowable questions like what it is to be a human being; the difference between sanity and insanity; the meaning of life and death; what's real and not real. All these subjects can literally drive you mad.
'Hamlet' is obviously a role a lot of actors want to portray or be involved with in some way and that I'd like to be involved in.
One of the things that makes Hamlet unique among Shakespeare's characters is his courage to face up to the darker elements of his personality.
Usually, you see this play as a guy who can't make up his mind, but our version is more of a revenge thriller than a man who is pontificating what he should do next. I've never seen a 'Hamlet' this big, this exciting, with this many cast members; it's quite a spectacle.
Macbeth is contending with the realities of this world, Hamlet with those of the next.
I don't think Hamlet is mad, nor is he predisposed to be a gloomy or tragic figure.