Hamlet's Advice to the Players (Michael Sheen, 1999)

"Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you." Michael Sheen, directed by Jeremy Mortimer (1999). Does this Hamlet follow his own advice? (You judge: not all of them do.) And how much credit/blame should the director get?
Available here: Available here: www.amazon.com/...
Read along: shakespeare.mit...
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Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to
you, trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it,
as many of your players do, I had as lief the
town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air
too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently;
for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say,
the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget
a temperance that may give it smoothness. O, it
offends me to the soul to hear a robustious
periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to
very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who
for the most part are capable of nothing but
inexplicable dumbshows and noise: I would have such
a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it
out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it.
FIRST PLAYER
I warrant your honour.
HAMLET
Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion
be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the
word to the action; with this special o'erstep not
the modesty of nature: for any thing so overdone is
from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the
first and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, the
mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature,
scorn her own image, and the very age and body of
the time his form and pressure. Now this overdone,
or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful
laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the
censure of the which one must in your allowance
o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be
players that I have seen play, and heard others
praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely,
that, neither having the accent of Christians nor
the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so
strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of
nature's journeymen had made men and not made them
well, they imitated humanity so abominably.
FIRST PLAYER
I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us,
sir.
HAMLET
O, reform it altogether. And let those that play
your clowns speak no more than is set down for them;
for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to
set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh
too; though, in the mean time, some necessary
question of the play be then to be considered:
that's villanous, and shows a most pitiful ambition
in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready.

[@okaminess]

Now I know why he's so amazing in his on-screen scenes. It's his extensive background in theatre in the 1990s that I basically never saw. Jesus. Wish I could see recordings of his theatre performances.

[@rubysky5359]

And now I just imagine this is Michael reading as Aziraphale 😭

[@brasschick4214]

Ruby Sky I can see Aziraphale coaching Hamlet at the Globe by example 😁

[@annashaw6538]

All I can hear is Azeraphel reading Shakespeare! "Come on Hamlet. Buck up"

[@okaminess]

@@brasschick4214 Aw!!!! Love that imagination.

[@TheImpossibleMan]

Sheen's audio performances as Romeo and Hamlet have impressed me.

[@zizopowerful85]

OMG! I love his voice 😍

[@ROKSpink]

I'm going to die listening to Michael Sheen's and Tom Hiddleston's voice.

[@okaminess]

Ooh, and BENEDICT C. :) My husband. lol Michael Sheen's my Mrs. Robinson. HAha

[@alexandervue9464]

Speak the speech I pray you as I pronounced it to you trippingly on the tongue
But if you mouth it as many of your players do, I'll had as leaf the town crier spoke my lines
Nor, do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently, for in the very torrent, tempest, and as I may say whirlwind of your passion
You must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness
How it offends me to the soul to hear a robustious periwag pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who are for the most part are capable of nothing but inexplicable dumb shows and noise
I will have such a fellow whipped for o'erdoing termegant, it out harrods herrod, pray you avoid it.

[@EvilEddtheRed]

Fabulous, thanks for sharing.
And thanks for all the other links - very generous.

[@berkleypearl2363]

Hamlet dunking on the clowns for their bad improv skills that distract from the show will never not be funny to me. It gives me flashbacks to all my days of community theater.
It’s even funnier to remember that Prince Hamlet was basically a Viking. It’s set in Denmark in ages long past. 600 years ago for Shakespeare was the year 1000. You always picture Hamlet in this elaborate Elizabethan garb. But I want you to imagine this Hamlet in a fine, soft-spun wool tunic, hemmed in tablet weave, wearing silver jewelry, standing in red leather turn shoes, contemplating suicide in a low hall. Far more closed in and shuttered than in high castle walls

[@jkta97]

I think Hamlet's dissing of the clowns is also a dig at Will Kempe, the actor who used to play the fools in Shakespeare's plays. If I recall correctly, Kempe had a tendency to play for laughs instead of actually acting the text the way Shakespeare wanted him to. Kempe's eventual replacement, Robert Armin, heralded a new era, and Armin played the fools as actual characters living in the world of the play, instead of one-note caricatures simply played to the audience.

[@ROKSpink]

Totally!
Loki and Aro are my favourite villains of all times.
I can proudly call myself a metalhead hiddlestoner and sheener. And maybe a sherlockian as well.
But Tom's voice is also magnificent!

[@tomalandavies]

1:09

[@abep7317]

0:23 2:15