
HAMLET CAMP
HAMLET CAMP, Modern Convict and Carriageworks at Track 12, Carriageworks, 14-25 January 2025. Photography by Daniel Boud: above Ewen Leslie; below Brendan Cowell; below again Toby Schmitz
According to Brendan Cowell’s “thanks everyone” words on opening night, Hamlet Camp has been a few years brewing as an idea born of a late-night, post-show ramble with a fellow ex-prince on a kerbside in the UK. Then, after more years chewing it over with old mates Ewen Leslie and Toby Schmitz and a meeting with Carriageworks’ Fergus Lenehan last November, suddenly it was a thing and happening. In other words, despite the years of mulling over: less than three months from woah to go.
Even without that insane timeline, the play is extraordinary, but perhaps no less so than should be expected of its principals. Each man has long been recognised as one of Australia’s most exciting actors, together they are dynamite. They’re also quite bonkers, devilishly attractive, and – now in their 40s – dangerously boyish when not being painfully grown up.
The latter description could also be of Hamlet, Shakespeare’s tragic, troubled prince and a character whose complexity and stature in the canon is one of its most notorious pinnacles. All three have scaled it at some point during illustrious and varied careers. And eventually, lived to tell of it. The consequence is Hamlet Camp, a largely autobiographical kaleidoscopic mix of therapy, reminiscence, acid humour, and hilarious pokes at the bear of the theatre establishment in general and uber directors in particular.
In Carriageworks’ Track 12 auditorium, five rows of bleachers are set up in a square around an empty playing space. The floor is decorated only with the crosses and stripes of coloured tape that denote where an actor is to stand on a set or stage. There are chairs. Lighting designer Jimi Rawlings illuminates the area and the audience from time to time. That’s it.
Rather than Hamlet’s soliloquy, the show opens with first Schmitz, then Cowell and finally, Leslie delivering their own thoughts on the actor’s life and whether living or dying is best as self-penned verse. It’s a saucy way to begin an exploration of surviving not just “the” role, but also the slings and arrows of outrageous audiences and critics. These monologues are more than doggerel, less than Bardic, teetering on self-indulgence yet never less than honest and endearing.
Essentially, they dig down to the base level of raw humanity and crazy courage required to do a job which means being pursued by a metaphorical bear every night of one’s life. Over 90 absorbing minutes we learn that these boyos take no shit – particularly their own – yet although they’d prefer not to suffer fools, the profession and their place in it as actors demand that they do. And they’re agonisingly, hilariously aware of that.
Hamlet Camp – in which they’re dressed in the unflattering outfits that denote either prisoners or asylum inmates – is a fascinating deep dive into territory rarely seen by outsiders. Their producer Claudia Haines-Cappeau makes two brief, telling appearances as a gracefully balletic Ophelia as well as a no-nonsense actor of the female sort; and Steve Francis injects telling and witty original music at rare moments, otherwise, it’s the trio of mates and their lifelong search for meaning, love and the kindness of strangers.
Hamlet Camp is surprising, illuminating, funny, and profound. Surprising in that, from time to time, it shines a bright light on each member of its audience and reveals unexpected truths that we might not have cared to notice before. In that, it’s actually very Shakespeare. A Don’t Miss occasion of theatre magic.
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