Globe Theatre stages ‘Hamlet- Prince of Denmark’ at Kinnaird

Birds chirping, leaves falling, bees humming, ladybirds crawling along with the breeze blowing softly on our strained eyes, our sweating, clasped hands, our alert ears. Such was the theatre, four hundred years back, when Shakespearean Globe actors weaved their magic on stage bringing to life the tragic heroes, the romantic lovers and the wise fools and such was the theatre not twenty four hours back, when Globe Theatre’s actors weaved their magic at Kinnaird College’s Perin Boga Amphitheatre, bringing to life ‘The Tragedy of Hamlet- Prince of Denmark’, the love of Ophelia and the wisdom of Horatio.

April 1, 2016 – one would have thought that Kinnaird College was fooling people about Globe Theatre performing Shakespeare’s Hamlet in Pakistan. It was only after last night that everyone witnessed Kinnaird College upholding and strengthening the essence of its legacy.

The play commenced at 6.30pm and continued for three hours, with a 15-minute interval.  A cast and crew of only 17 people travelling around the world role-played at least 30 people on-stage. This performance was in light of the old English theatre that was all about touring, trucking up to strange towns, and performing plays in inn yards, in fairs or even under the canopy of the sky.

This surely required a minimalistic props and crew members, with no major technical requirements of a sound system or lights. It was all about the intrinsic elements of performing arts: dialogue, acting and their deliverance.

This was precisely what the Lahori audience witnessed Friday night: the evening sun setting and giving rise to the clear navy, moonless sky; live music sung and played on barrels and trunks by the actors themselves. The incredible aspect of it was it remained in sync from the very first welcome note to the last of many bows they bowed.

The acting was incredible, the music regal and the direction was splendid. The most talked-of scene was the mouse-trap play where Hamlet performs a play – with his uncle the King, Claudius and his mother, the Queen, Gertrude as the audience – about a King and a Queen and that King’s dead older brother.

At least three actors only, namely, Naeem Hayat, Miranda Foster and Keith Bartlett performed these six roles. They switched their roles, but not clothes, expressions and gestures, but not the hairdo, and within that span of a few minutes, the audience was entranced in that captivating play-within-a-play technique. It could be better explained, but as an eyewitness, it could not have been performed better.

Kinnaird’s Perin Boga Amphitheatre’s seating of around a thousand was filled to the brim even though the tickets prices fared between Rs 1,500 and 5,000. It was insignificant who was seated where: when “Frailty – thy name is Woman”, “Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t” and “God has given you one face and you paint yourselves another” – such powerful and rooted dialogues we have studied and rehearsed time and again were universalised by Naeem Hayat and John Dougall. A realisation dawned on us, connecting us across geographical lengths and timeless barriers.

Naeem Hayat, playing Hamlet, exclusively announced that performing in Pakistan was rather personal and significant for him, for he had parental origins in Pakistan. The last time he visited the country was when he was 12.

The Lahori audience made the most of this timely opportunity, and it was visible in the long-held standing ovation given to the actors, that this performance was worth every single dime invested and every single minute given in it.