Almereyda\'s Hamlet the Play Hamlet

Almereyda's Hamlet

The play Hamlet is one of the most complicated and respected plays in all of theater. One reason for this is that Shakespeare's characters are written both powerfully and ambiguously. Therefore, the role of the director in a production of Hamlet is pivotal. It is the director that decides how the audience is to perceive the characters in Hamlet. For example, one of the central issues in Hamlet is whether Hamlet is truly mad or is feigning madness in order to entrap Claudius. It is the director that determines whether the audience sees a complicated and scheming Hamlet, or a Hamlet that has lost control of his own senses. The director's determines the actor's portrayal of Hamlet, which has a direct effect on the audience's perceptions of the supporting characters in the play. "Actors have traditionally struggled with this role [Hamlet], and it can be safely said that any one performance can only capture some facets of the creation" (Wikipedia). Ultimately, it is the director that determines what facets the actor captures, which, in turn, determines how the audience perceives the play. For example, if Hamlet is only feigning madness, then Ophelia is perceived as the ultimate victim, because it her perception of Hamlet's madness that has driven her mad. On the other hand, if Hamlet is truly mad, then Hamlet and Ophelia can be viewed as misguided soul mates. A director can use a variety of means in order to portray a story and characters. In his version of Hamlet, director Michael Almereyda uses technology and a modern setting to tell the story in Hamlet. Those who are accustomed to seeing Shakespeare's work in modern settings may not realize it at first, but there is something very striking about Almereyda's vision; almost every scene contains a piece of technology that is meant to either record events or replay those recordings. The most striking example is how Hamlet uses a video camera to set up his play within a play, but the more subtle examples are the cameras and other recording devices that have become a background to modern life. Almereyda's use of these devices, as well as other forms of technology, give Hamlet new relevance to an audience that may not understand or care much about the succession of monarchies, but does understand the consequences of corporate buy-outs. In addition, the fact that Almereyda has set Hamlet in modern times not only makes it more accessible to a modern audience, but also changes the image of Hamlet.

One of the most striking changes in Almereyda's film is the fact that Claudius is not a King and Denmark is not a country. Instead, Almereyda has chosen to make Denmark a corporation. Instead of usurping King Hamlet's throne, Claudius has taken over the corporation. This decision goes a long way towards making Hamlet more accessible to a modern audience. In the first place, the modern conception of succession in monarchy makes it counter-intuitive that Claudius, and not Hamlet, would be king after King Hamlet's death. Second, it makes easier to understand why Fortinbras gets to control Denmark. This issue is left somewhat fuzzy in the play; Fortinbras never wages war against Denmark, but comes in to take control at the end of the play. The audience is left to wonder why Fortinbras, rather than someone Danish, would get control of Denmark. However, in the context of a corporate setting, where levered buy-outs and hostile takeovers are commonplace, the idea of Fortinbras taking over Denmark Corporation is easy to explain and understand.

Furthermore, the fact that Almereyda has chosen to portray Denmark as a corporation reveals something about Almereyda's vision of modern America. One has only to watch one episode of the Apprentice to see how desperate many Americans are to become part of the upper echelon in corporate America. In fact, the American fascination with corporations has made those in power positions, like Jack Welch, Donald Trump, and Bill Gates, into celebrities, or modern royalty. Almereyda makes the point that:

There's still a class system in America, people who have things and people who don't, and people who have things tend to make sure they keep having them and controlling them, and that's aligned with corporate power, which is such an overarching power that you can't even attack it without becoming a part of it (Almereyda).

Therefore, the use of royal titles in Almereyda's Hamlet does not appear unusual; after all, love her or hate her; few people would disagree with a characterization of Paris Hilton as a princess. Why, then, would Hamlet not be a prince?

Finally, in light of the recent corporate scandals, a corporation may be the only place that can capture the corruption in Hamlet. The characters in Hamlet are notoriously corrupt. Of course, it is Polonius that is obviously corrupt, as he counsels his son to be dishonest, treats his daughter with contempt, and spies on Hamlet. While "Polonius may be the most obviously corrupt character...the centre of evil of the play's plot and of the kingdom is Claudius" (Moriarity). Only in corporate America does a character as obviously corrupt as Claudius seem at home.

After one has seen multiple productions of Hamlet, one comes to expect each production to place a different emphasis on Hamlet's madness. Therefore, one of the most striking things about Almereyda's Hamlet was that it completely de-emphasized Hamlet's madness. However, by taking emphasis away from the very scenes in which other directors have chosen to have their Hamlets act the most mad, Almereyda and actor Ethan Hawke have created something unusual: a Hamlet that is definitely mentally ill. While Hawke's Hamlet lacks the frantic lunacy of other Hamlets, the movie makes it clear that Hamlet is severely depressed. In fact, Hawke spoke of rock star Kurt Cobain, who ended his life by suicide, as his inspiration for Hamlet (Almereyda). By making Hamlet clinically depressed, Almereyda spanned three centuries in an instant, making Hamlet immediately accessible to a modern audience. Hamlet's indecision about how to avenge his father is automatically understandable to anyone who has suffered from depression or known someone suffering from depression. Actually, in a society where one is constantly bombarded with commercials for anti-depressants, one does not even need personal experience with depression in order to understand that one of the symptoms of clinical depression is a lack of initiative.

Ironically enough, Almereyda uses a showcase for technology to highlight Hamlet's utter lack of initiative. Hamlet's "To be, or not to be" speech is given while he is wandering through the action section at a Blockbuster video store. This scene is a wonderful example of how Almereyda has married the facets of modern everyday life with the story of Hamlet. Every member of the audience can connect with a man wandering somewhat aimlessly through a video store. In fact, there is a strong possibility that members of the audience were wandering aimlessly in the video store just prior to watching the movie. This connects the viewer with Hamlet in a way not possible in the original play. The audience, especially most members of an audience during Shakespeare's time, simply cannot identify with a prince whose uncle has interfered with his succession to the throne, and whose mother has married his father's brother a month after his father's death. However, every member of the audience can connect with someone, even a modern corporate prince, wandering through the video store. More so, the fact that Hamlet's famous speech about action vs. inaction occurs in the action section of the video store dramatically highlights the fact that, as of that point, Hamlet had failed to take any action.

In addition, as in any production of Hamlet, Hamlet's decisive and swift action against Rosencrantz and Guildenstern serves as a foil for his failure to take swift action against Claudius. However, in Almereyda's film, Hamlet's sentence of his friends is almost effortless. In fact, according to Alessandro Abbate:

Technological disembodiment also points to a psychological process that undermines the significance of one's actions, as the case of Rosencrantz's and Guildenstern's deaths illustrates. Almereyda hands down their sentence on disk: a word document locked into the memory of a Mac laptop replaces the King's letters, the deadly command they carry entrusted to the insubstantiality of digital space (Abbate).

In contrast, in the play, Hamlet has to "copy the letters, be careful to "write fair" (5.2.34), and seal them with his father's ring" (Abbate). The risk that Hamlet's deception will be uncovered has been eliminated, and murder has become as easy as a keystroke.

In a world where technology has made the elimination of two friends as easy as the press of a button, it is not hard to understand how Almereyda uses technology to emphasis Hamlet's loneliness and isolation. In Shakespeare's play, there are lines indicating that Hamlet was once a lively and engaged person. However, in Almereyda's Hamlet, one does not get the feeling that Hamlet has ever been fully plugged in to life. Hamlet lives vicariously through the devices that he uses to capture or replay reality. However, those devices actually serve to separate Hamlet from the very world he is seeking to capture. This concept is dramatically displayed by Hamlet's use of headphones. Though headphones generally provide a listener with music or other entertainment, Almereyda's makes it clear that they also serve a secondary purpose: to shut out the external world. Therefore, although Hamlet appears connected all the time, Almereyda makes the point that Hamlet uses technology and technological devices to shut out the other characters in the movie.

While Hamlet's use of the headphones displays his overt attempts to block out society, they are not the only way that technology interferes in interpersonal relationships. In fact, Almereyda consistently has technology, whether the hum of a jet or the ringing of a phone, interrupt human interactions. These constant interruptions cause a variety of changes in the production. In Hamlet, as written by Shakespeare, Hamlet does not start out as the melancholy and morose individual that has become associated with the idea of Hamlet. Instead, there are many references to Hamlet's good nature. Therefore, Hamlet's descent into melancholy traditionally indicates a marked change from his normal outgoing nature. In contrast, Almereyda uses technology to show the isolation and disconnection from society that so many people of Hamlet's generation experience. There is no indication that Hamlet's personality has changed, or that there has been a sudden increase in technology at Elsinore Towers. Instead, Almereyda makes it clear that Hamlet has used technology as a means to distance himself from society. This distance has helped create his depression. In turn, the depression increases his need to disconnect himself from society.

Hamlet is not the only character affected by the overuse of technology. Ophelia is similarly transformed in Almereyda's production. Although Ophelia can be played in a variety of manners, from shrinking violet to early feminist prototype; there is no question that Ophelia is generally sociable. In contrast, Almereyda creates an Ophelia that is far more introverted than usual. The introduction of an introverted Ophelia dramatically alters the most important secondary storyline in the play.

For example, in the play, it is clear that both Hamlet and Ophelia are struggling with dysfunctional family relationships. Obviously, in the play, Hamlet is dealing with the death of a father and his mother's sudden marriage to his uncle. Furthermore, from the Ghost's appearances, the audience understands that King Hamlet was not an idol of a man; instead of heading to heaven, the Ghost is in purgatory until he can work off the sins of his lifetime. Furthermore, even though he knows that his own brother has murdered him, in the play King Hamlet is more concerned with punishing his straying wife than getting vengeance upon his murdering brother, leaving one to question the relationships between all of Hamlet's family members. However, much of those relationships are left to the audience's imagination or at least the audience's interpretation of Hamlet's asides, monologues, and soliloquies. In contrast, Almereyda's film is able to demonstrate what is going on in Hamlet's mind by showing him as a filmmaker. By showing how Hamlet chooses to represent the truth of his own personal reality, Almereyda is able to demonstrate just how dysfunctional Hamlet's family relationships are.

In addition, in the play Hamlet, Hamlet is portrayed as a young man that is excited about the idea of the players coming to Elsinore. Not only does he look forward to their approach, but he appears to enjoy his discussions with them. In fact, in the play, "the players, it seems, are the only human beings that Hamlet trusts, and the only one he considers worthy of respect" (Abbatte). However, the technology available in modern society has made interaction with the players unnecessary, which emphasizes Hamlet's loneliness and isolation.

Almereyda takes this concept a step further with his portrayal of Ophelia. In the play, Ophelia's character is somewhat ambiguous. Her responses to her father and brother give the impression of a young girl that is striving to be dutiful. However, Julia Stiles' portrayal of Ophelia comes across as anything but a dutiful daughter. Ophelia is a photographer and seems to attempt to lose herself in the images rather than deal with reality. Ophelia's escapism is highlighted by the fact that she is frequently looking into space or at pictures when speaking with her family. Therefore, dialogue that appears dutiful in most productions of Hamlet comes across as rote. Ophelia is extremely disconnected from her family and her isolation is highlighted by the fact that neither Polonius nor Laertes seem to realize how much Ophelia is trying to escape from being forced to interact with them.

Furthermore, Almereyda gives the audience an opportunity to view Ophelia's thoughts. When Polonius reveals Hamlet's letter to Claudius and Gertrude, the audience sees Ophelia visualizing herself committing suicide. In this way, Almereyda uses technology to give the audience overt information about Ophelia's state of mind. This signals a departure from the play, because Ophelia is not even present in that scene of the play (Hamlet II.iv). One of the reasons that this departure is so significant is that it robs the announcement of Ophelia's suicide of all suspense or drama. The audience is not only suspicious of Ophelia's suicidal tendencies, but is even aware of at least one of the methods that she might choose to kill herself.

By far the most interesting use of technology in Almereyda's film is the ubiquitous presence of recording technology. On the page, Shakespeare's Hamlet is part revenge tragedy and part spy story, as Hamlet devices increasingly more complicated schemes to entrap his uncle and deliver his punishment. The presence of these recording devices emphasizes the fact that Hamlet is a story about spies and spying. However, the presence of recording devices in almost every scene and every location raises a question that is not present in Shakespeare's Hamlet or in most productions of Hamlet; why was Claudius' betrayal of Hamlet's father not recorded. In most productions there is no reason to believe that the betrayal was witnessed by anyone; therefore, there is no reason to wonder why Hamlet does not engage in a traditional investigation into the Ghost's allegations against Claudius. However, by placing recording devices in almost every scene, Almereyda creates the idea that there may have been some extrinsic proof of the betrayal. This idea makes Hamlet's idea of a play-within-a-play even less substantial than it is in more traditional productions of Hamlet.

In addition, that recording devices are almost constantly present lend an additional asset to the Gertrude and Claudius back-story. Productions of Hamlet vary in how they choose to portray the romantic relationship between Gertrude and Claudius. The play itself is ambiguous; however, even at that time a marriage within four weeks of a husband's death was unusual. Some productions treat Gertrude like a confused spouse who remarries quickly to avoid dealing with the realities that came with Hamlet Sr.'s death, while others go to the opposite extreme and treat her like an adulterous wife who was an accomplice in her husband's death. No matter how the productions treat the relationship between Claudius and Gertrude, there is no reason for the audience to believe that Hamlet has a way to really discover when their relationship began. However, simply by making recording devices present in almost every scene, Almereyda creates something new; the idea that Hamlet has a duty to either investigate his suspicions about Gertrude or stop accusing his mother of wrongdoing. After all, where there is no way for Hamlet to prove his suspicions about Gertrude, it makes sense for Hamlet to question his mother's motives and excuses some of Hamlet's behavior towards Gertrude. The situation changes tremendously when there is a possibility that Hamlet could easily prove or disprove his suspicions about his mother.

Perhaps the reason that Hamlet does not strive to prove or disprove a romantic relationship between Claudius and Gertrude that predates the betrayal is to avoid having to avenge his father. According to McConnell, Hamlet is not morally obliged to seek revenge for his father; instead his need for vengeance is at the root of Hamlet's complexity (McConnell). One of the most interesting ideas in most productions of Hamlet is that as Hamlet's need for vengeance grows, he becomes less of himself. In fact, according to Fidel Fajardo-Acosta, "in his desire for revenge and for the throne, Hamlet is not all that different from the villainous Claudius and is forced to descend to his own level: lying, scheming, and murdering in order to accomplish his ends" (Fajardo-Acosta). Interestingly enough, this idea corresponds with Almereyda's decision to downplay any portrayal of Hamlet's madness, because it dismisses the possibility that Hamlet's madness is genuine and illustrates the idea that part of Hamlet's complexity is forced and unnecessary. Simply by investigating the beginning of Gertrude and Claudius' relationship, or even by having a conversation with Gertrude or a confrontation with Claudius, Hamlet could have prevented all of the secondary tragedy that occurs in the play.

One of most seemingly obvious reasons for Almereyda's use of technology is that the absence of technology in a modern production of Hamlet would be conspicuous. The movie needs the technology in order to appear authentic. The modern world contains a tremendous amount of technology: laundry machines, jets, fax machines, telephones, and cell phones. A movie that omitted all use of such devices would seem inauthentic and inaccessible to modern audiences. In addition, the use, even the overuse, of such technology, shows how busy modern life is.

One of the technological features of Almereyda's film that was unusual at its time was the fact that the characters speak into the camera and are aware of an audience. Given the proliferation of reality television in the past few years, this technique hardly seems unusual. However, reality television was still relatively new at the time of production. One who viewed Almereyda's Hamlet in the theaters may have come out somewhat disoriented by the fact that the characters were speaking into the camera. Outside of the context of reality television, this feature gives the audience a feeling that it shares some big secret with the characters in the movie. However, once placed in the context of reality television, this feature seems normal. In fact, it is the fact that characters in a movie talking directly to the audience seems normal that demonstrates how dependent modern society has become on technology and the fact that the line reality and entertainment has blurred. Within the context of a society of reality television, these direct addresses to the audience add an additional element: a lack of trust. In the play Hamlet, the audience has no reason to question asides and soliloquies. In fact, because the play's characters are seemingly unaware of the audience, the asides and soliloquies are a means of letting the audience understand a character's innermost thoughts and feelings. However, once the audience knows that the characters are aware of an audience, the audience has to start doubting the veracity of the character's words. Returning to the "To be" speech example, the audience is now forced to wonder if Hamlet is truly suffering with an inner conflict about how to deal with Claudius, or if he is simply attempting to excuse his lack of action. Almereyda makes this point clear by presenting the audience with visual images of the characters' innermost thoughts. If those thoughts are given in images, then the audience has to wonder what type of censoring has occurred in the direct addresses to the audience. One side-effect of this phenomenon is that it makes those characters that do not directly address the audience, like Claudius, seem more sympathetic. Claudius' behavior is captured on camera, and he does not engage in speeches that come across as attempts to explain his behavior. Again, to place it in the context of reality television, he is the disliked character, but Hamlet is the seemingly nice character that transforms when he gets the opportunity to discuss the character flaws of his fellow characters. The audience is almost immediately made aware of Hamlet's dual nature, which makes it increasingly less likely that the audience will trust subsequent asides or soliloquies.

Almereyda does not use technology strictly to alter the meaning of Hamlet. There are certain circumstances where his use of technology emphasis the meaning of language used in the original text. In the play, when Hamlet tells Gertrude, "Seems, madam? Nay, it is. I know not seems" (Hamlet, I.iv), he seems arrogant and even somewhat rude to his mother. In contrast, in the movie, this language seems less offensive and more accurate. Hamlet carries a video camera and meticulously documents reality; therefore it appears that he does know what is. In fact, he not only knows what is, but is theoretically able to show anyone else what is. However, as a director, Almereyda uses this concept to highlight the fact that any artist, even one working in a medium that captures reality, chooses how to convey their version of reality. In the movie, Hamlet does this by altering or manipulating the images on video camera to produce the desired effect.

One of the biggest ambiguities in the play Hamlet is Gertrude's true nature. The audience wonders what Gertrude knows about Claudius' betrayal of King Hamlet, the nature of the relationship between Gertrude and Claudius, and Gertrude's role in her poisoning. However, in his film, Almereyda goes a long way towards resolving those ambiguities. For example, by making the conversation between Claudius, Gertrude, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern occur via telephone, Almereyda has the opportunity to show Claudius and Gertrude in an intimate setting. Gertrude and Claudius are all over each other, which sheds some light on one of the most ambiguous issues in Hamlet; Almereyda's Gertrude is lusty and wants Claudius. Almereyda also tackles the issue of Gertrude's poisoning. In Almereyda's movie, Gertrude knows that Claudius is attempting to kill Hamlet. In fact, according to Alexandra Marshall, Gertrude's "knowing that her new husband intends to kill her son -- "provides a tragic gravity that is missing when her death by poisoning is played as entirely accidental" (Marshall, 83). However, if Gertrude swallows the poison because she is aware of her Claudius' plan to kill Hamlet, it does not resolve questions about Gertrude's character, but simply provide more questions. After all, what type of mother rushes into marriage with a man that she believes would kill her son? If Gertrude knows of the plan, why does she choose suicide rather than denouncing Claudius as a murderer? Instead of making Gertrude a better mother and a stronger woman, the suicide adds layers of weakness and confusion to Gertrude that are not present in the play.