{"id":2132,"date":"2025-04-01T11:34:38","date_gmt":"2025-04-01T15:34:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/?p=2132"},"modified":"2025-04-01T11:34:38","modified_gmt":"2025-04-01T15:34:38","slug":"hamlet-spring-2025-tour-entry-8","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/shakespeare\/hamlet-spring-2025-tour-entry-8\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cHamlet\u201d Spring 2025 Tour: Entry #8"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Michael Wagg<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking back, from a Chicago thunderstorm and the shelter of a brewpub to our residency week at the University of Notre Dame: it was back to The Bend (South <\/em>Bend), back to base and back to basics. Three shows, eighteen classes and a chance to regroup with a home crowd and our much-loved colleagues at Shakespeare at Notre Dame.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The ND residency often happens at the beginning of the tour, after the final rehearsals, but in this case we returned for the penultimate touring week after eight on the road \u2013 weeks that we all agree have both flown by and taken years! – so it felt very much a homecoming. There\u2019ll be another one when we head back for our residency at ND London (at its swanky-placed base just off Trafalgar Square) and shows at the Cockpit Theatre and Dulwich Hamlet Football Club. Yes, Hamlet <\/em>at The Hamlet is happening.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three sold out shows in the intimate feel of the Decio Theater at Notre Dame gave us an opportunity to get some momentum back after three unusual weeks \u2013 a split location in Mississippi; a week off (in which we covered New Orleans, Nashville and New York City between us) and an academic Shakes-fest in Boston. Back at base we grabbed the chance of stage time to continue to develop the show; as well as refueling on French onion soup and pretzel bites at O\u2019Rourke\u2019s pub.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The enthusiasm of the audience response over three nights suggested either one of these paid off as all went well. Apart from my personal malfunction with a harmonica and a bit of fluff at the very business end of Saturday\u2019s performance, rendering the tragic debris of our stage briefly ridiculous. We did equally well to hold our giggles together and, thankfully, the rest was silence.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It was great to get back into the classrooms too, with the variety of subject that is the very joy of this job. Jack covered a course on Philosophy and Self-knowledge. Joanna led on Collaborative Theatre; Esmonde on The Bible; and Sadie on Wellbeing: writing and rhetoric. I explored The Tempest<\/em> and Milton\u2019s Paradise Lost<\/em>, site-specific in a chilly campus quad; as well as an introduction to The Bacchae<\/em> \u2013 which gave me a chance to try my Euripides\/trousers joke for a second time. [Read: you-RIP-a-DEES]. It went about as well as the first time and I now concede!\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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