ABSOLUTE SHAKESPEARE
By and with: Malin Sternbrink & Niklas Atterhall
Soppteatern, Kulturhuset, Stockholm
Seen with friend LJ (thank you!) 11 November, 2023
A melancholy man in a black overcoat, alone on the stage
playing 16th century music on a lute. A woman in red, high-heeled shoes, big
80's hair, enters the stage, singing 'What a Feeling.'
Man:
'To be or not to be...' Woman: 'I
want to dance with somebody...'
Shakespeare meets the 1980s.
It starts light-heartedly with new love, quotes from
Hamlet and A Midsummer Night's Dream interwoven with 'Let's
Dance,' 'A Lady in Red,' 'Kiss.' Then comes jealousy. 'Every breath you take.'
'The Green-Eyed Monster'. Love is not enough. Sadness, betrayal, anguish.
Many of my favorite quotes from Shakespeare are
included, both in English and Swedish. 'I have of late and wherefore I know not
lost all my mirth.' 'Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow...', 'there was a star
danced, under that was I born'. Jealousy and infidelity? Sternbrink and
Atterhall use one of Shakespeare's best scenes: Otello, Emilia explains to Desdemona why it is just as right for women
to be unfaithful as men.
Also ingenious is that it was Ophelia who quoted 'I
have of late...' not Hamlet, and 'Take me to a nunnery,' instead of Hamlet's
'Get thee to a nunnery.' Hamlet says, 'She stared at me...' instead of
Ophelia's, 'He stared at me.'
Sternbrink and Atterhall have put on a brilliant,
funny, emotional and beautiful interpretation of Shakespeare that shows, as
many have done, that Shakespeare is as relevant as ever.
If you live in Stockholm, see it.
Absolute
Shakespeare (kulturhusetstadsteatern.se)
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