As the applause finally died down after the fourth curtain call, my wife, Sarah, turned to me and said, “Now, that was a Hamlet I enjoyed.” In particular, it was Hamlet himself that she enjoyed; rather than a sour, dour, morose, obtuse, naval-gazing Hamlet, this prince was cunning, cynical, devious, sarcastic, and very much enjoying his feigned madness, his chess game with the king, and his fencing bout with Laertes.

That is the kind of interpretation we would expect from John Harrell, one of the ASC’s most gifted comic actors who has earned a reputation for playing cunning characters engaged in chameleonic strategies. We also expected, and got, a lot of laughs in this Hamlet. That was only partly due to Harrell’s delivery of Hamlet’s wit. Shakespeare’s sense of humor never abated even when he was writing the most nihilistic of tragedies (i.e., King Lear), and Hamlet is full of quips and comic characters.

Read the rest of Eric Minton's review of Hamlet on his website, Shakespeareances.com

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