‘Hamlet’ @ Auriga Productions
—Jan Farrington
It seems a bit disrepectful to call a theater company a “pop up”—but the term suits the intriguing Auriga Productions fairly well. From time to time, Auriga pops up with a new or classic play, gives it a good workout, and disappear into the mist—I’d guess until company founder and artistic director Bert Pigg calls them together again. One time it’s an outdoor King Lear, then Pinter’s The Homecoming, or (a few years’ back) a moving Terra Nova, Ted Tally's play about Scott’s doomed expedition to the South Pole.
You never know what’s next.
What they do in-between these ventures, apparently, is stay busy. The actors in Auriga’s current production—a Hamlet that had a Dallas-area run last month, and has now moved to Fort Worth—have credits from many North Texas companies and well beyond. Malcolm Stevenson, who does an excellent Claudius, has worked on and off-Broadway, and is known for the vivid character Nikolai in Taylor Sheridan’s hit TV epic 1883. Adriana Bate, his Gertrude, has performed in New York and L.A., and in everything from “Shakespeare to [Neal] Simon,” say the program notes.
This Hamlet—done in black-box, bare-bones style in the Sanders Theatre of the Fort Worth Community Arts Center—isn’t revelatory, but it is satisfying in most respects, giving us sudden, unexpected flashes of understanding that teach us something new about Shakespeare’s bottomless well of a play.
Brandon Whitlock makes a striking Prince, his shaved skull and snug clothing giving off an immediate “hipster Hamlet” vibe. Too simplistic, of course, but it’s where the portrait begins. While I’m on the visuals, is it happenstance or not that Whitlock’s Hamlet so strongly resembles his uncle, the murderous usurper king—played by whip-thin Stevenson with a shaved skull that mirrors his nephew’s? The Ghost of Hamlet’s dead father, played in military camo by the burly, broad-shouldered Carter Frost, is an entirely different type.
What sort of self-loathing and family confusion might this indicate? Just throwing it out there—a nice talking point, say, if you found yourself in post-show conversation with director Bert Pigg or the cast.
If there’s a hesitation about Whitlock’s performance, it’s that his Hamlet’s habit of uber-fast speech sometimes works against clarity. This fellow is a chatterbox—to the point that in a couple of the most famous soliloquies, Hamlet simply slides into the room already talking, as if we’re getting the “sound” portion of the non-stop conversation he’s having (with himself) in his head. It’s a neat effect, but perhaps takes over the characterization too thoroughly.
Still, he manages the various transitional points of the character very well. In opening scenes, Hamlet is grieving for his father’s death and his mother’s sudden re-marriage to his uncle; the tone is despondent and snarky. Only a few scenes later, he is incandescent with shock and rage. What’s changed? He’s seen his father’s ghost, heard the accusation that he was murdered. He’s hell-bent on finding the truth.
And so it goes, Hamlet’s journey (and his internal emotions) shifting with new information and events. He is watchful and cunning; no, he is mad; ah, he’s only pretending. Or not. We wonder about his professed love for Ophelia (Sarah Flick)—but in the end, no matter. In an intense moment, Whitlock comes within an inch of Ophelia’s face to ask: “Where’s your father?” When she lies, revealing she’s a pawn moved by others (even if she may truly love him), Hamlet loses control. He is alone, he knows now—and Ophelia may get herself “to a nunnery” for all he cares. That face-to-face is as unmoving a moment as we ever see from Whitlock’s Hamlet—and it lingers.
Stevenson is excellent as the cold, ambitious Claudius, who probably tells himself that he loves his brother/victim’s Queen—and that he’s a better King. Family feeling never penetrates Claudius’ smooth surface—he gives a death order for Hamlet the minute he senses a threat. In a memorable tableau, he and Hamlet find themselves kneeling in prayer (or the pretense of it, at least), side by side-eye. Bate is a dignified Gertrude; she loves her son but is puzzled by him, and seems entirely deceived by Claudius…until she’s not, and acts with sudden courage.
Flick is a very little-girlish Ophelia, perhaps a subtle jab at the full-of-himself Hamlet, who might not be looking for an uppity woman. Ophelia’s little family, father Polonius (played by Kate Winnubst) and brother Laertes (Joshua Hahlen) seems warm and connected—and when their support (and Hamlet’s) are stripped away from her, Ophelia’s spiral into despair is almost inevitable.
Bee Falcone and Hayden Casey are amusingly toadying as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, college friends of Hamlet come for a sudden visit—happy to be “employed” as spies by Claudius, as the Prince guesses almost immediately. They are an utter contrast to Hamlet’s faithful Horatio (Joel Frapart), the friend who never wavers, and who is left behind to tell his story. (The tweaked script uses Horatio as a nicely simple framing “device” to open and close the play.)
Frost is imposing as the late King Hamlet’s lingering spirit—and like the military gent he portrays, knows how to give a terse order in few words. Where he waves, Hamlet follows. On the invisible ramparts of the castle, men in military blacks with automatic weapons patrol the perimeter. (They double as the roving Players as well.) If there weren’t “something rotten” in Denmark, why would this pleasant castle be a fortress? Though Elsinore sees no foreign invaders in this production, Claudius’ shaky hold on power hints at the future.
Not a “high concept” Hamlet, but a sturdy one, complete with a satisfying clash of swords (fight choreography by Adam Kullman) at the end. A more-than-decent place to start if you’re introducing a young person—or yourself, for that matter—to Will Shakespeare’s masterpiece.
And I’ll be interested to see where Auriga “pops up” next.
WHEN: May 10-19, 2024
WHERE: 1300 Gendy Street, Fort Worth (FW Comm. Arts Center)
WEB: auriga-productions
