To Be or Not to Be Video Interpretations

The two video interpretations that I chose of Hamlet’s most famous soliloquy contain similar aspects, but they also differ wildly in other regards. Both interpretations manage to imply the extreme solitude of Hamlet and his inability to trust anyone or anything. In the first video, Hamlet walks around a large, unoccupied room, and his footsteps sound loud and sharp to assert his loneliness. In the second video, Hamlet occupies a very dark and quiet space most likely to express the same idea that he is completely alone.

In addition to conveying extreme solitude, both videos also put emphasis on a specific passage of the soliloquy through the actors’ actions. Both actors draw swords when they say, “Who would fardels bear,/To grunt and sweat under a weary life,/But that the dread of something after death,/The undiscovered country from whose bourn/No traveler returns” (3.1.84-88). The action of drawing a sword highlights the tough decision that Hamlet faces because it makes clear the simplicity of suicide but also the argument against it, which is the uncertainty that death presents.

As for the wildly different aspects of the different interpretations, the two actors, though they both express pain, go about their expression of the emotion very differently. The actor of the first video gazes at a mirror and slowly walks toward it as the message of his soliloquy deepens; he conveys his internal distress by focusing on himself and speaking in a very somber and contemplative whisper. The audience can see his pain by recognizing the apparent inner turmoil that the actor so accurately portrays. In the second video, the actor looks directly at the camera and asserts his pain and confusion by making very twisted facial expressions and yelling his statements and questions at the audience.

The two actors also emphasize different things in their deliveries of the soliloquy.  The first actor emphasizes his introversion and the scholarly approach that he takes to weighing his options – dealing with the struggles that life presents or putting an end to everything through suicide. He accomplishes this emphasis through his staring at himself, walking toward himself, and speaking quietly. The second actor puts emphasis on the difficulty of the decision “to be or not to be” (3.1.64) through his emotional yelling and distorted expressions of pain.

Personally, I appreciate the first actor’s portrayal of the soliloquy more than the second because I believe that Shakespeare intended the delivery of the lines to be soft and introspective with much pain that isn’t yelled at but inferred by the audience. Both videos, however, manage to convey Hamlet’s solitude, pain, and confusion in one way or another, so they both meet the criteria of the soliloquy.