Don’t sleep on this Summer’s production of Hamlet from the Lethbridge Shakespeare Performance Society

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Hamlet. While I missed their Legacy Park Performance on Friday July 8, I caught opening night at Casa, Thursday, July 7 at Casa Plaza.

Hamlet continues this week at several locations in Southern Alberta. Photo by Richard Amery

 Having it at Casa following the Upside Downtown  concert series was a brilliant move as they already had a good sized crowd out for John Wort Hannam’s opening night performance for Upside Downtown.

 Most of them stayed around for Hamlet.

 

Director Shelley Scott ’s presentation of Shakespeare’s epic tragedy has been trimmed to a enrapturing, not to mention svelte hour and a half hour performance.

 

 But you get all of the hits— The best known speeches from Hamlet including the “get thee to a nunnery,”  “ To Be or Not to Be,” and “Neither a borrower nor a lender be,” speeches and a lot more.

 

 There’s a lot of action, treachery, mystery afoot and much more.

 

 The talented cast draw a lot of humour from a play where pretty much everybody dies at the end.  There is also a lot of humour drawn from the play within the play.

 

 Rosencrantz ( Ginny Bergsma) and Guildenstern (Stephanie Watson) provide physical comedy and ukulele.

 

 David Burton’s Polonious is especially humorous, if not a little over the top.

 

Hamlet continues this week at several locations in Southern Alberta. Photo by Richard Amery


 

As expected the play has a lot of drama. John Poulsen is aptly sinister as conniving King Claudius.

 

 Jesse Thibert  is a wonderful  Hamlet, conveying a variety of emotions from introspective to anger and a touch of insanity.

 

 Cole Fetting shines as usual as Laertes. He and Thibert have a thrilling duel  at the climax of the play.

 

There are several presentations of Hamlet this week including  July 14 at Casa at 7:30 p.m; a ticketed event at the Nikka Yuko Japanese Garden on Friday, July 15 and in Coutts for the Coutts Arts Festival outside of Nanton, Sunday, July 17 at 2 p.m..

— By Richard Amery L.A.Beat editor

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