When I was in high school, I read bits and pieces of Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar, but the only Shakespeare play I read in its entirety is Hamlet. Therefore, when I found out in D term that we would be seeing Hamlet when we attended The Globe, I was very excited and could not wait to see the play performed live. Before heading to the show, my flatmates and I decided to make it a Shakespeare themed night. For dinner, we headed to Anchor, a pub very close to the theater. The pub is one of the oldest in London, and it is said that Shakespeare himself has eaten there. The pub has an older feel to it with its dark wood and unique setup (multiple rooms, not all the same shape). One of the walls in the main section of the pub has many Shakespeare-like mini portraits. While the pub, of course, has changed, and the food is completely different, it was interesting to see a place that survived the Great Fire and holds so much history.
When I studied Shakespeare in school, my English teacher showed us drawings of the outside of The Globe and I was happy to see how much the recreation resembles the original version and the illustrations I saw. I think it is amazing how the city of London allows The Globe to have a thatched roof, even though they are against code now. I believe this is because The Globe is such a historic site and it was built twice with the thatched roof before it was a violation. When I walked into the theatre, I was stunned to see the amount of detail. I had believed that only the stage would be decorated, but parts of the walls had portraits painted on them. After learning so much about Shakespeare and The Globe in high school, I loved being surprised and learning something new.
My favorite part of the play was the “To be or not to be” soliloquy. My favorite assignment of my high school career was recreating the soliloquy to represent a decision that would tear me apart. With that assignment, I discovered my love for poetry and have used it as a form of expression to help me go through rougher times. Since then, that section of Hamlet has been special to me ever since. Watching it performed live was spectacular; the actress reciting it used a combination of emotion and simplicity to give a stunning performance. While it sounds cheesy, listening to the soliloquy brought me back to the assignment and the start of my love for poetry and brought a few tears to my eyes. The only part of I would have liked to change is to have my English teacher there to share it with me.
Another interesting part of the play for me was making Guildenstern deaf. While I do not know if the actress who portrayed Guildenstern was deaf or not, the idea makes this performance of the play special to me. If the actress was deaf, I am ecstatic that the director added her as a part of the show and made others learn sign language to incorporate her part. If they decided to only portray the part as deaf, however, I am still glad that the deaf community is represented. There are not many deaf characters in media – older or modern media. I loved every scene that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were in because of this.
Overall, I loved my experience with The Globe and Hamlet. I hope that one day I will be able to return and see the play performed again, and under a different director, to see the differences in production.