Based on the novel by Maggie O’Farrell.
Adapted by Lolita Chakrabarti
Directed by Erica Whyman
Designed by Tom Piper
Music by Oguz Kaplangi
The Royal Shakespeare Company
The Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon
Saturday, 15th April 2023 13.30
CAST
Madeleine Mantock – Agnes
Tom Varey – William
Peter Wight-John, Will’s father / Will Kempe
Elizabeth Rider- Mary, Will’s mother
Harmony Rose-Bremner -Susanna, their oldest child
Ajani Cabey- Hamnet their twin son / Thomas Day
Alex Jarrett – Judith, their twin daughter
Sarah Belcher- Joan, Agnes stepmother
Obioma Ugoala- Bartholome, Agnes’ brother
Rose Riley- Tilly / Caterina, Agnes step sister
Will Brown – Burbage / Father John
Frankie Hastings- Eliza, Will’s sister
Karl Haynes – Ned, an apprentice / Condell
Hannah McPeake- Jude, Agnes’ friend
MUSICIANS
Alice Brown – viol, fiddle, recorder
Sidiki Dembele- percussion, kamale ngoni (woodblocks)
Phil Ward – guitar, lute
The RSC have done well with ‘Shakespeare and era related’ productions. Wolf Hall was not Shakespeare related, but was 16th century. Then Robert Harris’s Cicero related to the Roman plays. We missed the latter. We saw Wolf Hall (link to review) and Bring Up The Bodies (link to review) at the Aldwych in London. Several friends saw it in Stratford and loved it. We were up high in the huge and horrible London theatre and the whole was distant, remote and dull.
Hamnet re-opens the Swan Theatre after extensive repairs and renovations. The seats are definitely more comfortable. The jury’s out on the various steps. Heights vary which is tricky. We saw one man fall over and another trip.
It’s virtually sold out, and will transfer to London’s Garrick, but experience shouts out SEE IT IN STRATFORD! There’s an even greater reason than the intrinsic quality of the theatre (which is way better than any West End theatre). We walked past New Place to get there, where Will Shakespeare and Anne Hathaway spent their final years, just a couple of hundred yards away at the other end of Chapel Lane. William and Anne Shakespeare are buried in Holy Trinity Church, as is their oldest daughter Susannah, and the spire is visible above the trees. We’ve seen John Shakespeare’s name in the list of mayors on the wall of the Guildhall, just up the road. We are right where these people lived and died. This adds such a major element to the production, which is why it was such a good idea to put it on here. You can feel the proximity.
I haven’t read the best-selling 2020 book. 1.5 million people have. Friends who have read it advise it’s so good that it should be read AFTER the play. We also will need to get over the Shakespeare family in Upstart Crow which is heavily imprinted – we’ve watched all the TV episodes at least twice, plus the stage play. Also, why has Anne Hathaway become Agnes? It says Anne on her tombstone, though apparently she was christened Agnes. I was slightly worried that Will might turn out to be a Bill, Billy, or worse, Willie.
The play has been re-sequenced in chronological order by Lolita Chakrabarti, so programme and reviews say. I looked at an online synopsis- it already has a ‘study guide’ which is going some for a three yer old novel. This is a sensible move for a stage play.
The set by Tom Piper is very wooden and bare, making us think Globe / Wanamaker (with better seats and no silly candles). Is the new very solid looking central platform area how they’re repairing the problematic roof that closed The Swan, or is it just the set for this play? Ladders are lowered either side, forming and giving access to an attic, and forming a giant A.
There are positives. No deaf actors signing (sorry). No one in wheelchairs. The cast is easily 50% female actors but crucially it’s written that way, which was always my point. If you want 50% female, choose plays written for it. After two productions we had thought were so way below RSC standard, The Tempest, and much worse, Julius Caesar (the worst RSC production we’ve ever seen – and many comments on my review agree), Hamnet is a strong return to form. Erika Whyman, as we’ve seen in the past, is a first rate stage director. She is also temporary Artistic Director for the company. Her direction is in a different league to the two poor earlier productions by other directors. It’s fast, fluid, articulate.
Sarah Belcher as Joan, Agnes’ stepmother. Peter Wight as Will’s father. Will is getting it from both of them.
It’s a love story of course. We meet Will as a Latin Tutor to Agnes’ stepbrothers. Agnes is rural (just outside Stratford). Will is urban from the middle of town. Agnes has a vicious stepmother. Will has a vicious father, and the Shakespeares are not popular due to John Shakespeare’s dubious dealings. Bartholme, Agnes’ brother is most suspicious. Joan, her stepmother loathes them. They bond from mutual dislike of their parents, not uncommon.
The set design is excellent. The cast throughout is even better than excellent. Madeleine Mantock as Agnes will be a very strong candidate for best female actor of the year. All the support works. Peter Wight would do the same for best support actor as John Shakespeare / Will Kempe. Everyone is crystal clear in delivery. The light touch of West Midlands accent for the women is finely judged, never veering into Upstart Crow comedy Brummy, yet retaining an edge.
I read an online discussion on the novel a while back. There was a strong gender divide, and it’s fair to say women commenting were more enthusiastic than men (as with My Brilliant Friend). We are in a women’s world with Agnes Hathaway. She is a herbalist and seer (far more women are than men). The practicalities of medicine, childbirth and dying were women’s matters in the 16th century, and you would not have to go that far back for the same to be true. There is a great deal of childbirth, illness and dying too, all surrounded by the women
The posed ‘production shot’ doesn’t do their performance justice. It looked better than this.
Alex Jarrett as Judith, and Ajani Cabey as her twin, Hamnet, deliver terrific performances when the plague hits the family. The dying scene is more convincing and so more moving than in most Shakespeare plays.
It’s not colour blind. The play text falls over backwards to state which characters are mixed heritage and which are not, stating it in the character list and again in the stage direction as each of the characters enter. Does this go back to the novel? There’s a programme essay on people of colour in the 16th century, and that mentions the Dark Lady of the Sonnets (but doesn’t link that to Agnes, which I would have in the circumstances). I didn’t think it really needed explanation, we accept that Agnes, her brother and children are all mixed heritage. I thought the notes on ‘mixed heritage’ and ‘white’ in the play text were a sensible precaution against future colour blind directors. I still recall the Richard III where Edward IV and Elizabeth were white, and both the actors playing the young princes were mixed heritage. When Richard of Gloucester throws out his accusation of illegitimacy, you had to think, well, visually, I think he has a fair point. Similar accusations fly from the irascible and violent John Shakespeare here when he hears Agnes is pregnant. I think Lolita Chakrabarti wise to forestall an obsessively colour blind production.
We were impressed by Obioma Ugoala as Bartholme, the brother. He was also given the roles of carrying his sister and nephew around, a hard task, and in the latter case it should perhaps have been Will who carried his dead son, but Obioma Ugoala obviously has the physical strength necessary.
London: Will with Richard Burbage (Will Brown). Peter Wight doubles as Will Kempe.
In the second part, Will (Tom Varey) is off to London. It’s hard to say why, but from his first appearance I felt he looked and seemed like my idea of a young Shakespeare. Good costume helps. There are scenes with Richard Burbage (Will Brown) and Will Kempe (Peter Wight doubling with his great role as John Shakespeare). They need to tread carefully here, as it brings the scenes in Upstart Crow readily to mind. The first scene we see them rehearsing is Mercutio (Will Shakespeare) and Romeo (Burbage). They bring on Thomas Day (played Ajani Cabey) as Juliet with a bad wig, a skirt and a slash of lipstick and UPSTART CROW is being shouted from the rooftops. I might have avoided getting so close to the TV sitcom and film, though I suppose if you’re going to show boy actors playing girls, it is inevitable. There was a point where Susanna did a teenage eye roll that also referenced the very Brummy stroppy teenage Susanna of Upstart Crow.
The use of twins in Twelfth Night (not only twins, but a girl and boy) and Comedy of Errors are important links from Judith and Hamnet to the plays. The Twelfth Night reference is cunningly taken back to the birth scene.
Will It’s like a mirror. I can’t tell them apart. They’re one person split down the middle.
It’s an important plot hinge, because Agnes, with her gift as a seer, knows they will only have two children, and they are presented with three. So Will is responding that they’re two parts of a whole.
How have you made division of yourself?
Antonio in Twelfth Night, Act V
An apple, cleft in two, is not more twin
Than these two creatures.
Later, we see them rehearsing The Comedy of Errors. I think they failed to see a minor problem:
Burgage (as Antipholus of Ephesus) Dromio, what stuff of mine hast thou embark’d?
He is addressing Will Kempe who is playing the servant twin, Dromio. We discussed it afterwards. As he said ‘Dromio …’ we both thought he’d said ‘Romeo …‘ and the thought, ‘Hang on! I thought you were playing Romeo.’ A tiny issue. Maybe a different line from The Comedy of Errors would have worked better. However, it does lead to:
Will Kempe (as Dromio) Methinks you are my glass and not my brother.
On the London scenes, I thought the discussion of moving to Bankside and opening The Globe was too forced, and also a tad ‘What do you know? We’ve got a show!’ beloved of musicals when they decide to renovate an old theatre (The Young Ones, Crazy For You … etc).
The end connection to Hamlet is powerful, with Ajani Cabey as Hamnet, playing Hamlet, and Will Shakespeare playing the ghost of Old Hamlet. I had forgotten the long theatrical tradition that Shakespeare used to play the Ghost.
Madeleine Mantock ages well in the role, especially when she sets off to London with Bartholme. I would guarantee we will see very much more of her in future, and of Tom Varey.
The music from way on high in the Swan minstrels gallery had lute and percussion blocks. It was a major contribution to the action throughout.
We’re going for four star. Acting, direction, set, lighting, music. The “serious” press are tending to three stars. The word ‘slight’ appears twice in reviews. I think that snotty.
Not everything is King Lear, nor should it be. Hamnet is emotive, it’s entertaining. It’s the perfect choice to re-open The Swan Theatre here in this location. No. It’s not five star, not a “great work of art” but then that’s the original material. It’s great popular theatre and will go on.
****
THE LOO QUESTION
Much of what has been going awry recently at the RSC is summed up by the revised toilets. The women’s remain. The men’s, never good, has been replaced by “All Gender Cubicles.” I watched. That fast developed a queue entirely of women. Men were reluctant to join the all female queue and like me, walked through the shop to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre toilets. Then they had a bag check to go back into the shop and back through to the Swan. This will work as long as the The Swan and The Royal Shakespeare Theatre never have simultaneous intervals. Men also need a male space. The walk doesn’t work for the several very elderly men either. It’s incredibly inefficient too. I will expand on this in a separate rant. Effectively they have eradicated the Swan Men’s toilets.
WHAT THE CRITICS SAID
five star
James Garrington, The Reviews Hub *****
four star
Georgina Brown, Daily Mail ****
Suzy Feah, The Financial Times ****
Paul Raven, West End Theatre, ****
three star
Dominic Cavendish, The Telegraph ***
Arifa Akbar, The Guardian ***
Dominic Maxwell, The Times ***
Quentin Letts, Sunday Times ***
Susannah Clap, The Observer ***
Fiona Mountford, The i, ***
Sam Marlowe, The Stage ***
LINKS ON THS BLOG
REPRESENTATIONS OF SHAKESPEARE
Shakespeare in Love, by Lee Hall, after Marc Norman, Tom Stoppard, West End 2014 (Tom Bateman)
The Upstart Crow, by Ben Elton, West End, 2020 (David Mitchell)
ERIKA WHYMAN
The Winter’s Tale (filmed), RSC 2021
Miss Littlewood, by Sam Kenyon, RSC 2018
Romeo & Juliet, RSC 2018
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, RSC 2016 (Bear Pit Company)
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, RSC 2016 (Belvoir Players)
Hecuba by Marina Carr, RSC, 2015
PETER WIGHT
Uncle Vanya (filmed) 2021
Much Ado About Nothing, Old Vic 2013 (Dogberry)
SARAH BELCHER
The Tempest, RSC 2012
Twelfth Night, RSC 2012
The Comedy of Errors, RSC 2012
WILL BROWN
The Fantastic Follies of Mr Rich, RSC 2018
Duchess of Malfi, RSC 2108
Peter Viney's Blog 
From Paul Newman:
Many thanks for the Hamnet review. You mentioned that you hadn’t yet read the original book and I thought you might be interested in this review I made after reading the book soon after it came out in 2020.
All the best, Paul
“HAMNET by Maggie O’Farrell, Tinder Press, London, 2020.
Hamnet was William Shakespeare’s son, one of twins, who died aged eleven. An introductory note by this author tells us that Hamnet and Hamlet are the same name, interchangeable in Stratford records in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Centred around Hamnet the story takes in all of Shakespeare’s family, bringing them to life as characters rather than simply historical names we may have heard of. It goes back into the time before Shakespeare was famous and before his children were born. We learn of Shakespeare’s father, the glove maker, a bitter and violent man, a cheat who once held a high position in the town but was politely shunned by those in influence later. Most surprising of all is the character of Anne Hathaway, or Agnes to give her real name. The ‘g’ is silent so her name sounds a lot like Anne. She is a wild and independent creature who can see into people’s minds and into the spirit world and heal with herbs and incantations. The way this story tells it Agnes becomes pregnant on purpose so that she and Will can marry as he has already asked for her hand but been denied by both sets of parents. In fact the book is really the story of Agnes (Anne Hathaway), an extraordinary woman in this account.
The sixteenth century way of life is exceptionally well researched not only in everyday visual details but in the attitudes and outlook of the time, with similes and metaphors that fit the period. Pestilence or plague were rife in those times with Shakespeare often returning to Stratford when the London theatres were shut and it reminds us of the present day lockdowns with the similar closure of entertainment venues.
The author admits that most of the story has to be fictional, actual facts on the characters of Shakespeare’s family other than their names are scarce and lost in time. But she has given us an entertaining and perhaps alternative view of the Bard’s life that fits with what is historically known.”
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