Bernardt/Hamlet -- To see!

I was pretty blue Tuesday. It happens. But as luck would have it I had theater tickets. And those tickets were to Bernhardt/Hamlet. When I emerged from the theater, I’d been re-energized and uplifted. I felt like I could do anything.

This is one wonderful play. The language is rich but relatable. The acting is first rate. The story is funny but serious. The incomparable Janet McTeer is again, a marvel. And while I’ve seen Dylan Baker and Jason Butler Harner in many things, I’ve never seen them like this.

Wrapped inside the story, you get bonus bits of Cyrano de Bergerac along with Hamlet, as Bernhardt might’ve played him which is to say stronger and better defined.

 There are several themes – timely themes - woven into this historical fiction. The overriding one is female empowerment and the very nature of femininity. Must a woman always be the weaker human who is more superficial and fragile? Can she not speak truth more powerfully than an indecisive man? The critic in the cast has a line that cuts to the quick. “A woman with power is a freak,” he says to Bernhardt. At what point does a woman with self-confidence turn into an egomaniac in the eyes of others?

They even slip in questions about Shakespeare. Did he borrow from other playwrights? Is he accessible or does the iambic pentameter of his poetic dialogue (described as “da-dum, da-dum, da-dum, da-dum, da-dum”) take away from his universal themes? Is it heresy to re-interpret him?

And there’s nature vs nurture. How did growing up without a father and being born to a Jewish mother affect Bernhardt?

 This is a play to think about, learn from, discuss, and just plain relish.

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