Hamlet: Wyndham's Theatre, London
IT HAS been just months since Dr Who star David Tennant whipped up a frenzy of excitement by playing the Prince of Denmark on stage (and then caused an almighty dollop of disappointment when a back injury caused him to pull out of multiple performances).
Now it’s the turn of Jude Law, a Hollywood A-lister who can ensure a sell-out run.
And if the great Dane is a part to test the mettle of any actor, Law lives up to expectations.
Director Michael Grandage had promised a “very different take” on Shakespeare’s most revered play and described Law as a “muscular, visceral actor who has a very direct connection with raw emotion”.
And raw he is. Law’s portrayal of Hamlet is startling in its intensity and he wrestles with Hamlet’s anguish with a furious, vigorous physicality.
He never lets us forget that, while Hamlet is famously introspective, he is also sardonic, savagely self-reproachful and engulfed by grief and rage.
He is, after all, contending with the death of his father by his murderous usurping uncle and is being urged to exact a bloody revenge.
Law’s anguished portrayal has its drawbacks, lacking the humour and subtlety of some more mercurial interpretations, but he is engrossing to watch.
When he accuses his mother of “living in the rank sweat of an enseamed bed” you can feel his contempt, while his rendition of the “to be or not to be” soliloquy goes right to the marrow.
The falling snowstorm during this celebrated speech is one of several beguiling moments in Grandage’s stark, modern-day production. His Elsinore is a dark, forbidding place with towering walls: a prison to echo the prison of Hamlet’s tortured mind.
It is clear that Grandage’s emphasis is on the psychological core of the play and he sacrifices some of the political dimension to do so.
But nothing is rotten in the state of this production. all the relationships are beautifully pitched. Even Hamlet and the barefoot ghost of his father (a mellifluous Peter Eyre) are a credible father and son, while Laertes (Alex Waldman) and Ophelia (the fresh and youthful Gugu Mbatha-Raw) make for a touching brother and sister.
Ron Cook provides some welcome comic relief as the fussy old courtier Polonius. Penelope Wilton meanwhile is a less lustful and more sensitive Gertrude than I’ve seen in a long time.
This is the final production in the Donmar’s West End residency at the Wyndham’s Theatre and, while it is a largely bleak affair, it provides a captivating climax.
VERDICT 4/5
Box office: 0844 582 5120
Until August 22
