ROMEO AND JULIET - Stratford Festival

OF INTEREST
The longest play
It is the longest play Shakespeare wrote, running 4 1/2 to 5 hours uncut. Hamlet has more
lines than any other Shakespeare character: 1,530.
Women in tights
Women who have played Hamlet: Sarah Bernhardt, Sarah Siddons, Eva Le Gallienne,
Siobhan McKenna and Judith Anderson.
Ghostwriter
Tradition says Shakespeare played the ghost in the original production.
The red queen
In his Hamlet, Henry Miller says of Gertrude: “Somehow I can't detach her from the
image of the Red Queen in the Alice tale.”
Savage or human?
According to Michael Pennington (who played Hamlet, 1980): “One of the reasons
audiences admire the play so much is that everybody in their own lives almost every day
faces the kind of crisis that Hamlet faces, that is, do you behave like a reactive savage or
like a rational and sensitive human being?”
ON THE INTERNET
For the text of the play online:
http://shakespeare.mit.edu/hamlet/index.html
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ABOUT THIS PRODUCTION
PERIOD AND SETTING
Shakespeare's play takes place in Denmark, during pre-Viking days. Some believe it was
during the time of Canute (1014 to 1035). Asimov suggests 1050.
Our production will be set in a royal household during the Edwardian period, around
1910.
CASTING
Hamlet.................................Ben Carlson
Polonius……………………Geraint Wyn Davies
Gertrude…………………...Maria Ricossa
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