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Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Redolent with insecurity and directionless action, self-deprecating humour, scrappy intellectualisms and off-the-shelf existentialism, Tom Stoppard's student play is tailor-made for a student company like OUDS, who apply themselves to the task of ripping comedy out of Hamlet with all the gusto of English students sick to death of dramatic significance. The play, if you didn't see the film, follows the story of two minor players in Hamlet, school friends from Hamlets' youth, who keep an eye on him, spy on him, and eventually take him to England to be put to death, only to die in his place. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead is about these dubious characters; from their awkward entrance to the comic-relief footnote of their off-stage death. What do they make of the situation? Is Hamlet really mad? Why do they take him to his death? Why do they have to die? In answering these questions, the play takes in the law of probability, the nature of trust and the divine right of kings, not to mention the direction of the wind, the rape of the Sabine women (uncut) and whether it would be embarrassing to be caught stretching another man's legs. The cast are well up to it, with only the player king's constant thrusting of herself into the limelight just on the edge of being annoying - the other players all performing their plays within plays with a finely judged amateurishness. The main parts hammed it up cheerfully for the funny bits of Hamlet, with Al Gilmour (Hamlet) especially good, croaking his lines like a geriatric Olivier. But, on stage from interval to curtain, Anthony Shuster's blustering Guildenstern and Martin Roe's vulnerable Rosencrantz gave top-quality comic timing, effortless performances, and just enough bewildered wretchedness to give bite to the comedy. Jeremy Dennis |