2007 SEASON    

PRODUCTION NOTES

Hamlet {solo}
By William Shakespeare
Directed by Robert Ross Parker
July 24 - 28, 2007

WINNER of the 2006 Montreal English Critics Circle Award for Best Visiting Production, Hamlet {solo} plays the York Shakespeare Festival in Newmarket prior to a run at the world famous Assembly Rooms at The Edinburgh Fringe Festival, in Shakespeare’s birthplace Stratford Upon Avon and London, UK.

Resurgence brings you Hope and Hell's Hamlet {solo}, an exciting one-man version of Shakespeare’s Hamlet performed by Raoul Bhaneja described by Canada’s national newspaper The Globe and Mail as "an impeccable stage and screen performer". This unique retelling of one of Shakespeare’s most beloved classics debuted in Toronto in January 2006 at Theatre Passe Muraille. It played to packed houses and critical praise in the summer of 2006 as part of the world renowned Banff Summer Arts Festival, Off Off Broadway at Center Stage New York, the 4th New Classical Theatre Festival in Montreal and most recently at On The Waterfront Festival in Nova Scotia.

This thrilling evening focuses on the three most essential elements of theatre: The Actor, The Text and The Audience. This production is best described as "bare bones" in its presentation with Bhaneja playing seventeen parts in a two-hour version using only Shakespeare’s text. In describing his one-man version of Hamlet, Bhaneja says, "For many of us, our most powerful experience with the play Hamlet occurred on our first reading of it - outside of the theatre - where we, alone, had to conjure up the setting, characters and drama. With this production, the audience is guided through the actual text, almost in the way an ancient storyteller might do, where the actor/storyteller provides an outline of a character that the viewer extrapolates upon."

Bhaneja and director Robert Ross Parker began developing the project in 2000 while members of the Soulpepper Theatre Company. Hamlet {solo} combines the ancient art of storytelling and the modern "one-man show". This production draws on diverse influences such as Clare Coulter’s intimate performance of Wallace Shawn’s The Fever, Robert Lepage’s Elsinore and Bhaneja’s experience at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in London while a member of the International Artistic Fellowship in 2002 (he was also awarded the Christopher Plummer Scholarship). In addition to watching over twenty different productions of the play from all over the world, Bhaneja played Laertes in Hamlet at Halifax’s Neptune Theatre in 2000. He is also the subject of a Hamlet {solo} documentary feature and television project for BRAVO directed by Jeff Stephenson that charts the seven year development of Hamlet {solo} and includes interviews with a number of Canadian actors including Colm Feore, Brent Carver, Ben Carlson, Ken Welsh and John Neville.

Made possible by the assistance and support of the Canadian Actors’ Equity Association.

Visit the Hamlet {solo} website - http://www.hamletsolo.com

Photo: Raoul Bhaneja, Hamlet {solo}

2007 SEASON