HAMLET- THE CLOWN PRINCE

BASED ON SHAKESPEARE’S HAMLET
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH AND GIBBERISH
DURATION: 100 MINUTES WITHOUT INTERVAL
A CINEMATOGRAPH PRODUCTION
DIRECTOR: RAJAT KAPOOR
PERFORMED BY: ATUL KUMAR, RACHEL D’SOUZA, SUJAY SAPLE, NEIL BHOOPALAM, NAMIT DAS & PUJA SARUP
LIGHTS: GULSHAN DEVIAH
SOUND: ASMIT PATHARE
BACKSTAGE: SUMIT

SYNOPSIS
A BUNCH OF CLOWNS ARE PUTTING UP A SHOW OF HAMLET- THEY SOMETIMES MISINTERPRET THE TEXT, SOMETIMES FIND NEW MEANINGS IN IT, SOMETIMES TRY AND UNDERSTAND IT, VERY OFTEN MAKE A MESS OF IT.
THEY CHOSE TO USE SOME PHRASES FROM THE PLAY AND MIX IT WITH GIBBERISH. THEY EVEN EDITED THE TEXT, THREW OUT SOME IMPORTANT SCENES, AND MADE A MESS OF THE ORDER OF THINGS AS IF THE PAGES GOT MIXED UP. BUT THROUGH THIS ALL THEY WERE SIMPLY LOOKING FOR THE ESSENCE OF HAMLET, AND TRYING TO FIND A CONTEXT IN OUR OWN TIMES.

HAMLET- THE CLOWN PRINCE
Rajat Kapoor, Director, says: "Hamlet is a play that has fascinated me for a long time- as I am sure it has theatre practitioners all over the world- over the last 4 centuries. Of course we had to find a way to do it. Also- my last few productions (C for Clown, The King’s Last Tear- as well as the Blue Mug directed by Atul Kumar of which I was a part) have all been creations- not based on a text but something that was created during the rehearsals.
This is a process that is truly exciting for me and we wanted to continue on the same road.
That is how one thought of using the clowns to kind of interpret Hamlet.
It allows us a direct entry into the text- and we are able to interpret it directly bringing our sensibilities into the text."

Schedule
Kyra Indranagar, Bangalore 5th August @ 7:30 pm Rangashankara J P Nagar, Bangalore
6th August @ 7:30 pm
7th & 8th August @ 3:30 & 7:30 pm Bookings: www.indianstage.in