To Thine Online Self Be True

Wiess Tabletop Theater’s parody of a Shakespeare classic has been reprised roughly every four years since 1967, and though it has always been revised by each new generation to keep jokes and references relevant, it’s safe to say this year’s online show was particularly novel. 

“It was a lot of innovating as we went along,” said Adrian Almy, the show’s director and a sophomore at Wiess College. “We had a basic idea of what we wanted to do, but whether everything was going to work was very much up in the air until we actually did it.” After the 2020 live performance was canceled last year, the crew began work on a virtual version. Almy, who had joined the writing team in fall 2019, took on the challenge of directing last summer. The team started rehearsing in September and finished filming last November. 

Almy thinks audiences will find familiarity in the new format. “It’s like  you’re watching ‘Saturday Night Live’ — the cast is doing everything for the first time when it’s recorded, but the audience isn’t necessarily watching it at the same time,” Almy said. Aside from a few minor edits, the recorded show kept the same script intended for the 2020 version. Additionally, many cast and crew members returned to reprise their roles on the virtual screen. There was some reshuffling of parts; most notably, Grace Vincent went from playing Gertrude to playing Hamlet. “It felt so cool to be the first girl to play that part,” Vincent, a Brown College junior, said. 

All of the scenes were filmed over Zoom, which meant some significant technical challenges. “Most of the videos were shot in tiny dorm rooms,” Almy said. “For instance, Chase Brown [Witch 3] had about 3 feet of space that she could put her green screen in.”

After everything was recorded and edited, the final version was ready to go in February. “Hello, Hamlet! 2020” was livestreamed on the Wiess Tabletop Theater YouTube channel beginning Feb. 27 and is still available here. — Savannah Kuchar '22