Making of Hamlet: Part One

Who is crazy/kind/awesome enough to let a total stranger come in and photograph the process of taking a play from page to rehearsal to stage? The Honest Pint Theatre Company is. This year (2016) they have been working long and hard to put on an uncut production of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and I had the privilege of sitting in on parts of that journey. This particular collection is from an evening when they rehearsed Ophelia’s madness scene (insert VERY unprofessional but excited jumping up and down) and the play-within-a-play in a basement classroom of William Peace University. In the play, these two scenes take up a total of about twenty minutes; rehearsal lasted for three hours. Hamlet here is being handled with care and honesty (and a surprising amount of humor), by people who are committed to being in the moment, and are ready to try anything. Without further ado (or should I say 'much ado' hahahaha…I’ll stop), here is rehearsal number one!