CONDENSED HAMLET – Katrina Kennett

Enter Bernardo & Marcellus / Francisco & Horatio

Bernardo.          Who's there?

Francisco: Nay, answer me. Stand and unfold yourself.

Horatio:              Friends to this ground.

Marcellus What, has this thing appear'd again to-night?

Bernardo: I have seen nothing.

Enter Ghost

Look where it comes again!

Marcellus: In the same figure, like the King that's dead.

Horatio: Stay! Speak, speak! I charge thee speak!

Ghost exits

Horatio: As you know, Fortinbras, of mettle hot and full, does recover of us, foresaid lands by his father lost

Bernardo: Let us impart what we have seen tonight unto young Hamlet

Horatio: Let’s do it

Claudius:         Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother’s death the memory be green

Therefore our sometime sister, now our queen

What wouldst thou have, Laertes?

Laertes:          Your leave and favor to return to France

Claudius:         But now my cousin Hamlet, and my son…

Gertrude:         Good Hamlet, cast thy nightly color off

Hamlet:           These but the trappings and the suits of woe

Claudius:         ‘Tis unmanly grief

Exit everyone but Hamlet

Hamlet:           But two months dead – frailty, thy name is woman

Enter Horatio

Horatio:           My lord, I think I saw the king your father

Hamlet:           Where?

Horatio:           Upon the platform

Hamlet:           I’ll visit ‘twixt eleven and twelve

Enter Laretes & Ophelia

Laretes:          Sister, beware Hamlet and the trifling of his favors, perhaps he loves you now, but you must fear he does not

Ophelia:          I shall the effect of this good lesson keep

Enter Polonius

Polonius:  Laertes! This above all, to thine own self be true

Laretes:          Farewell

Exit Laertes

Polonius:         What is it between you and Hamlet?

Ophelia:          I do not know, my lord, what I should think

Polonius:         I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth give word or talk with the Lord Hamlet

Ophelia:          I shall obey, my lord

Enter Horatio & Hamlet

Horatio:    Look, my lord, it comes!

Hamlet:    King! Father!

Hamlet and Ghost go off alone

Ghost:      I am thy father’s spirit, doomed for a certain term to walk the night and for the day confined to fast in fires

Hamlet:    O Heaven!

Ghost:          Revenge my foul and most unnatural murder! Sleeping within my orchard, thy uncle in mine ears did pour cursed hebenon. Remember me!

Enter Polonius and Reynaldo

Polonius: Your bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth (hands Reynaldo letter for Laertes)

Reynaldo: My Lord (leaves with letter)

Exit Reynaldo. Enter Ophelia, crying

Polonius:     How now, Ophelia! What’s the matter?

Ophelia:      Alas my Lord, I have been so affrighted! Lord Hamlet came before me

Polonius:     Have you given him any hard words of late?

Ophelia:           No, I did repel his letters and denied his access to me

Polonius:     That hath made him mad! Come, go we to the king

Enter Claudius, Queen, R & G

Claudius: Welcome, dear Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. I entreat you both - what afflicts him?

Gertrude: Thanks Guildenstern and Rosencrantz

Exit R&G, Enter Polonius

Polonius: I have found the very cause of Hamlet’s lunacy!

Gertrude: I doubt it is no other but the main, his father’s death and our o’erhasty marriage

Polonius: Ophelia gave me this! (Gives Queen letter)

Claudius: (peeking at letter) Do you think ‘tis this?

Gertrude: It may be very likely

Exit all but Polonius. Enter Hamlet, reading a book

Polonius:       What do you read, my lord?

Hamlet:              Words, words, words

Polonius:         (to himself) Though this be madness, yet there’s method in’t

Exit Polonius

Hamlet:              These tedious old fools!

Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Hamlet:              My excellent good friends! Denmark’s a prison

Rosencrantz: Prison, my lord?

Hamlet:                  What a piece of work is a man!

Enter Players

Guildenstern: There are the players!

Hamlet:              Welcome! Can you play “The Murder of Gonzago”?

First Player:   Ay, my lord

Exit all but Hamlet

Hamlet:              The play’s the thing, wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king!

(camera looks at Polonius and Claudius who spy on Hamlet)

Hamlet: To be, or not to be, that is the question. Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or, to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them.

Ophelia (tries to hand him things): My lord

Hamlet: Get thee to a nunnery!

Exit Ophelia and Hamlet

Claudius: He shall speed to England!

Polonius: Do as you please, but after the play, let his queen mother all alone entreat him

Claudius: Madness in great ones must not unwatched go

Hamlet: Horatio! There is a play tonight before the King. Observe mine uncle

Horatio: Well, my lord.

Enter everyone – sit down at bench

Gertrude: Come hither, my good Hamlet, sit by me

Hamlet: No, good mother, here’s metal more attractive

Polonius: O, ho! Do you mark that?

Player Queen. O, confound the rest!  A second time I kill my husband dead  / When second husband kisses me in bed.

Player King. I do believe you think what now you speak;  But what we do determine oft we break.  

Player Queen.  Both here and hence pursue me lasting strife,  If, once a widow, ever I be wife!

Gertrude: The lady doth protest too much, methinks

In “play” the Player King falls asleep and is poisoned in the ear by the Player Brother

Claudius: Give me some light. Away!

Courtiers: Lights, lights lights!

Exit everyone but Horatio & Hamlet

Hamlet: Didst perceive?

Horatio: Very well my lord

Enter Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Guildenstern: The queen hath sent me to you

Enter Claudius, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Claudius: I like him not – he to England shall along with you (gives R&G a letter)

Rosencrantz: We will haste us (put on backpacks)

Exit R & G. Enter Polonius

Polonius: My lord, Behind the arras I’ll convey myself to hear the process.

Exit Polonius

Claudius: O, my offense is rank, it smells to heaven

Claudius prays. Enter Hamlet

Hamlet: Now he is praying; and now I’ll do it! And so he goes to heaven, and so am I revenged? No!

Hamlet leaves Claudius praying

Polonius hides behind wall hanging in Gertrude’s room, Enter Hamlet

Gertrude: Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended

Hamlet: Mother, you have my father much offended

Hamlet threatens mom

Gertrude: Help, help, ho!

Polonius: What, ho! Help! Help!

Hamelt: How now, a rat?

Kills Polonius by stabbing through curtain

Gertrude: O me, what hast thou done?

Hamlet: I must to England, goodnight mother

Exit Hamlet dragging Polonius’ body, Re-enter Hamlet

Hamlet: Safely stowed

R&G: Hamlet! Lord Hamlet!

R: What have you done with the dead body?

Hamlet: The body is with the king! But the king is not with the body…

Exit R&G, Enter Claudius

Claudius: Now, Hamlet, where is Polonius?

Hamlet: In heaven – seek him I’th’other place yourself

Claudius: Hamlet, everything is bent for England

Hamlet: Good

Exit all but Claudius

Clauidus: ...and England, the present death of Hamlet! (Seals letter)

Army marches across, led by Fortinbras’ Captain. Hamlet is going to England with R&G

Hamlet: Good sir, whose powers are these?

Fortinbras: Fortinbras!

Hamlet: O, from this time forth, my thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!  (Hamlet Sneaks away – R&G continue on)

Enter Gertrude & Horatio & Ophelia

Gertrude: How now Ophelia

Ophelia: He is dead and gone, lady, he is dead and gone

Exit Ophelia. Enter Claudius, Laertes right behind

Claudius: Laertes!

Laertes: O thou vile king. How came he dead? I’ll be revenged!

Claudius: Good Laretes, I am guiltless of your father’s death

Enter Ophelia, acting crazily

Ophelia: There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance, pansies, that’s for thoughts

Exit Gertrude & Ophelia

Laertes: Do you see this, you gods?

Clauidus: Laertes, Hamlet returns, and for his death no wind of blame shall breath, call it accident

Laertes: If you could devise it so...

Claudius: I’ll prepare a chalice

Laertes: I’ll anoint my sword

Enter Gertrude

Gertrude: Your sister’s drowned, Laertes

Laertes: Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia, And therefore I forbid my tears

Exit all

Enter Gravedigger and Man

Gravedigger: What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?

Man: The gallows-maker, for that oulives a thousand tenets

Enter Hamlet and Horatio

Hamlet: What man dost thou dig for?

Gravedigger: One that was a woman, sir, but rest her soul, she’s dead

Tosses skull to Hamlet

Hamlet: Alas, poor Yorick, I knew him Horatio.

Enter priest, Claudis, Gertrude, Laertes with garlands and ringing bells

Gertrude: Sweets to the sweet. Farewell (lays wreath on grave)

Priest: Here she is allowed her virgin crants, her maiden strewments, and the bringing home of bello and burial

Laertes: Lay her I’th’ earth, and from her fair and unpolluted flesh, may violets spring

Hamlet comes out of hiding

Hamlet: What, the fair Ophelia?

Laertes: The devil take thy soul! (they wrestle)

Gertrude: Enough!

All exit, camera follows Horatio and Hamlet

Hamlet (frustrated): Enough of this!

Horatio: Peace! Who comes here?

Enter Osric, wearing a funny hat

Osirc: The King, sir, hath wagered with Laertes

Horatio: (looks scared) You will lose, my lord

Hamlet: The readiness is all, since no man of aught he leaves knows what Is’t to leave betimes

Enter Claudius, Gertrude, Laertes, et all

Hamlet (to Laertes): Give me your pardon, sir: I've done you wrong;

Laertes: I am satisfied in nature, but in my terms of honour, I stand aloof

Hamlet:  I embrace it freely. Give us the foils. Come on.

Swordfight

HAMLET: (hits Laertes) One.

LAERTES: (doesn’t think he was hit) No!

HAMLET: Judgment?

OSRIC: A hit, a very palpable hit.

CLAUDIUS: give me drink. (drinks) Hamlet, this pearl is thine; Here's to thy health (puts poison pearl in glass and lifts it)

HAMLET and LAERTES swordfight

Gertrude: The queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet. (lifts cup for cheers)

KING CLAUDIUS (alarmed!) Gertrude, do not drink.

QUEEN GERTRUDE: I will, my lord;

Laertes: (looks worried b/c he knows about poison)

HAMLET: (mocking) Laertes: you but dally

LAERTES (angry) Say you so? come on.

They fight - LAERTES wounds HAMLET; then in scuffling, they change swords, and HAMLET wounds LAERTES

QUEEN GERTRUDE falls

OSRIC: Look to the queen there, ho!

LAERTES: (feels poison working and falls) I am justly kill'd with mine own treachery.

HAMLET: How does the queen?

QUEEN GERTRUDE the drink, the drink, I am poison'd!

GERTRUDE Dies

HAMLET (angry!) O villany!

LAERTES (dying): The king, the king's to blame.

HAMLET (realizes he’s been poisoned, looks at sword) The point!--envenom'd too! Then, venom, to thy work!

Stabs KING CLAUDIUS – CLAUDIUS dies

All: Treason! treason!

LAERTES: He is justly served                LAERTES Dies

HAMLET: Horatio, I am dead; tell my story.

They hear army coming

HAMLET: O, I die, Horatio;

    On Fortinbras: he has my dying voice (hands crown over)

    HAMLET dies

HORATIO: Good night sweet prince:

Enter FORTINBRAS, and army

PRINCE FORTINBRAS: What is this sight?

HORATIO: How these things came about: so shall you hear. This can I truly deliver.

ENGLISH AMBASSADOR rushes in

First Ambassador: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead!

PRINCE FORTINBRAS

    I have some rights of memory in this kingdom (puts on crown)

    Let four captains bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage.

(Fin)