Hamlet Hail to the Thief review – study of righteous anger links Shakespeare to Radiohead

In each the hype astir the collaborators connected this co-production betwixt the Royal Shakespeare Company and Factory International, it is casual to hide what is astatine its centre. It is not the co-directors, Steven Hoggett and Christine Jones, contempt CVs that agelong from American Idiot to Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. It is not adjacent Thom Yorke, the Radiohead frontman who has gutted and repurposed the band’s doomy 2003 medium Hail to the Thief for the show’s soundtrack.

No, it is simply a 425-year-old play by William Shakespeare – and a startling show by Samuel Blenkin arsenic the bereaved prince, who does so person arsenic overmuch to obstruction against the satellite astir arsenic Yorke and his set did successful the aftermath of September 11 and the ascendancy of George W Bush.

It was Jones who made the transportation betwixt Hamlet and the Radiohead album erstwhile she was moving arsenic a decorator connected different accumulation of the play 2 decades ago. Both are characterised by angry-young-man tirades against power, corruption and lies, but successful this staging, the links betwixt the 2 are near implicit.

What it is, successful Blenkin’s hands, is simply a survey of righteous anger. With unkempt hairsbreadth and hangdog demeanour, helium has motivation unit connected his side, arguing carefully, logically, exactingly astir the hypocrisy of the uncle who has murdered his begetter and the complicity of the nine that facilitates him. He is simply a dependable of a procreation exasperated by the failures of his superiors, his twitchy paranoia arsenic existent arsenic the fury that erupts erstwhile helium confronts Gertrude (an eminently tenable Claudia Harrison) oregon enters a twitchy pas de deux with Claudius (a spineless Paul Hilton).

A satellite retired of kilter … Romaya Weaver and James Cooney successful Hamlet Hail to the Thief. Photograph: Manuel Harlan

With Frantic Assembly’s Hoggett astatine the wheel, this is simply a Hamlet which, adjacent astatine a brisk 100 minutes, finds clip for physical-theatre sequences to embody a satellite retired of kilter. It is successful the frivolous gestures of a partying court, dancing to Go to Sleep, oregon successful the mode Hamlet becomes imbalanced by gravity erstwhile helium tells his friends helium has mislaid his mirth.

It is each played retired betwixt the half-dozen Fender amps laid retired connected an austere acceptable by the plan corporate AMP moving with Sadra Tehrani, and lit with brutal precision by Jessica Hung Han Yun, whose monochrome palate gets nary warmer than a smoggy yellow. With truthful overmuch angst, adjacent Ophelia (an uncompromising Ami Tredrea) gets a crook astatine “to beryllium oregon not to be”.

And, yes, judge the hype: Yorke’s arrangements are tremendous. Performed by a five-piece band, isolated successful dependable booths and accompanied with overmuch reverb by singers Megan Hill and Ed Begley, it rumbles and twitches, erupting successful large swells of electro-rock sound astatine the moments of top intensity. Ophelia’s derangement is expressed via the wonky nursery rhyme of Sail to the Moon; Hamlet’s snowy instrumentality to Elsinore delivered with a falsetto Scatterbrain; and the execution of Polonius (Tom Peters, much well-meaning than fatuous) is followed by the roar of There, There.

There is simply a interaction of the Grand Guignol successful the spectacle and the unusual communicative shortcut, but Hamlet Hail to the Thief works arsenic a lucid, angsty revenge tragedy, played with clarity and verve.