Sir Ian McKellen’s Blind Prince splits critics

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Sir Ian McKellen

When William Shakespeare wrote Hamlet, the main character was around 30 years old. So it was always to spark interest when stage and film veteran Sir Ian McKellen was cast for the role.

The play’s new blind production officially opened at the Theater Royal Windsor this week, barely 50 years since the 82-year-old actor first took on the role.

Critics have called it “bold”, “compelling” and “random mess”.

The Guardian awarded it three stars.

Its screenwriter Arifa Akbar said Sir Ian brought “brilliant undertones and daring” to his role as Prince of Denmark in director Sean Mathias’ production.

“If it’s madness – and it sometimes feels like it – there is method, and McKellen slows down for lesser-known speeches, moving the heart of the piece away from blockbuster soliloquies and focusing on beauty and depth of those meditative moments, ”Akbar wrote.

“A prince of all times and all ages”

The ratings were drafted however for the game being “marred by some eccentric decisions,” she noted.

“The eccentric decisions include cutting out Hamlet’s first searing soliloquy: McKellen begins it, only to leave the stage and come back to collect his thoughts while spinning on a stationary exercise bike. To be or not to be is later delivered. At a barber shop. If the point is, we have the deepest thoughts in the most mundane places, those scenes always seem tense and remote from the rest of the room. “

Still, she concluded: “The salvation of the production, ultimately, is the play itself whose power rests so much on the shoulders of its lead role. McKellen’s low-key artistry makes Hamlet a prince of all – and at any time and at any age. “

Actress Frances Barber stars alongside Sir Ian McKellen in Hamlet at the Theater Royal Windsor

The Telegraph was less enthusiastic in the title of its review, however, stating: “Ian McKellen’s Blind Prince cannot fool audiences – no matter how tough they are.”

The article is no longer available online, but the same newspaper reviewed one of last month’s previews more favorably.

The story continues

“This Hamlet lights up when the ‘actors’ come to town and the main point is that, throughout, he doesn’t just believe in the role, he is committed to the value of the theater itself – it’s inspiring. “

It must be said that many young actors have played older roles of Shakespeare, like King Lear, over the years.

Speaking to former BBC arts editor Will Gompertz in April, the Lord of the Rings star joked: “I played Gandalf who was over 7,000 years old. No one said that I was too young! “

“I can’t pretend I’m 20, no one is going to believe it,” he explained. “But I feel like I’m 20”.

Four-star Paul Taylor of The Independent was so engrossed in Hamlet’s latest “electrically brave” production that the age gap between his star and his main character simply disappeared.

“The on-screen fame has given McKellen a degree of leeway he didn’t have when he was just a phenomenal stage actor, and now he’s got the freedom, you might say, to don the rolls and let out his inner Ena Sharples, ”Taylor wrote.

Insensitive to age and gender

“The miracle here – and it’s a great achievement – is that McKellen subsumes entirely in an interpretation of the part that makes you, for long periods of time, completely forget the difference between his calendar age and the official age of the hero. (which, by the end of the play, is probably 31) He does so by being entirely true to his fresh, totally lived-in take on the play. “

Aside from being age blind, the play – which has previously been performed by an all-female cast – is also completely gender blind.

Last weekend, days before opening night, two of its key players, Steven Berkoff, who was to play Polonius, and actress Emmanuella Cole, who was to play her son Laertes, both stepped down.

Ashley D Gayle took over from Cole, while Frances Barber took over from Berkoff

The Independent’s former sister newspaper, i News – now owned by JPIMedia Publications, which publishes The Daily Mail and Metro – was not as impressed as The Independent, however, distributing only two stars.

Despite Sir Ian’s obvious charms, critic Sam Marlowe found the play “inconsistent” and “a random mess”.

Sir Ian McKellen played Hamlet 50 years ago, before starring in The Lord of the Rings and X-Men

“Gender swapping is a routine these days,” Marlowe noted. “A Hamlet played by an 82-year-old veteran, however, is daring, and Sir Ian, for all his skill and charisma, never persuades us to forget his age. Neither does he access an elusive essence or to a new idea – although he’s too thin an actor for his performance to be irrelevant. “

She added: “Frances Barber’s silky, sleek Polonius offers a slight relief, and Ashley D Gayle’s passionate Laertes shines. But for all the talent involved, it’s a random mess that leaves you wondering what the heck. you just witnessed – and what were they thinking. “

“A fascinating new perspective”

Sir Ian, clearly indifferent to the age difference, also recently told Radio 4’s Front Row that he played Hamlet as bisexual – in reference to the character’s childhood friend and, according to him, to the former possible lover Rosencrantz.

Reviewing his efforts in Mail Online, Patrick Marmion called the veteran’s reworking of Hamlet “mesmerizing.”

“Once you suspend your disbelief, it’s a fascinating new perspective on the Prince of Denmark,” he wrote.

“You can see more polished productions than that – it can be rough and spy on the edges,” he added.

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