where be your jibes now?

Laura and I saw Hamlet at the Chicago Shakespeare Theater on Sunday. (Thanks, so much again, Laura)

It is my all-time favorite play. Hamlet is totally my imaginary Danish boyfriend. Smart, funny, dark, brooding, deep, tortured, passionate, sarcastic...sigh. How twisted is it to have a crush on a fictional character?

The actors were excellent (Hamlet, while not as hot as I would have liked, was an interesting morph of Tom Hanks and Albert Brooks. Ophelia was sweet, honest and went heartbreakingly insane--that scene when she's completely lost it and is singing and rambling and handing everyone imaginary flowers makes me cry every time I read or see it.) The stage was very sparse, black, and I really liked how they removed part of the floor to be the grave with actual dirt in it.

It's been a while since I've read criticism on the play, and I'm sure I've come across this before, but the playbill had a very well written essay in it that's stayed with me. I'll end this post with the gist of it: He wrote about the theme of questions in the play. He begins by saying the whole play begins with the question, "Who's there?" He cites the obvious "To be, or not to be"...that is THE question aspect, and ponders the significance of Hamlet asking questions of Yorick's skull.

What is more ironically silent, than a skull?