Hamlet National Theatre

Hamlet, Olivier Theatre, Oct 1.

No Hamlet ever seems complete or definitive. There are so many aspects to the character- the melancholy, the passion, the mad, the noble or the studious- that any account can hardly embrace them all without looking incoherent but only emphasizes some at the risk of underplaying others.

Rory Kinnear's Hamlet makes a creditable effort at covering all the angles and he gathers some power in the soliloquies but, spending so much time dressed in t-shirt, trackie bottoms and trainers and smoking a fag, he does remind one of Wayne Rooney and so might stay in my mind as the chav Hamlet. More thoughtful than Rooney, admittedly, but nonetheless somehow representative of our times. With Alex Lanipekun's Laertes bearing a passing resemblance to Nicholas Anelka, the sword fight might have been lifted from any recent Man. United v. Chelsea match except the football authorities have so far missed the trick of allowing players to carry swords.

Not everything added up. Certainly the surveillance culture that we saw as use of CCTV in last year's RSC production has been brought forward in the form of suited henchmen keeping watch, wearing a wire and hanging round in doorways but I struggled to find what other themes Nicholas Hytner was pursuing in this renewal.

I'm afraid Patrick Malahide's Claudius was non-descript and lack-lustre and could have been a stand-in for someone unavailable who could inhabit the part. It wasn't credible that he could fire up Laertes to do his dirty work for him and despatch the turbulent prince. Neither did he generate any lewdness or libido with his new wife, certainly not enough to upset Hamlet's view of female sexuality.

Clare Higgins as Gertrude was well portrayed as past her prime and usually within reaching distance of a bottle of spirits, falling apart, but Claudius didn't add much to the impression of a dissolute Danish court. He didn't look as if he'd ever had the statesmanship, bearing or charisma to make the loss of them a significant thing.

So it is a rather underwhelming verdict to say that this preview performance has scope for Rory to grow further into the part and that the lighting was one of its more memorable elements, like the leg byes and no balls contributing a useful part of a cricket score.

An engaging, enthralling Hamlet can, and obviously often has, compensated for doubts that less successful productions allow one to realize. This year I've seen respected Shakespearean authorities, like Profs. Wells and Bate, nominate their favourite Shakespeare plays without mentioning Hamlet. Much to my surprise and even consternation as I have long assumed, as Barry Humphries says in today's Times, that it is 'the greatest play ever written'. Ever written, perhaps, but perhaps not staged, then. It can't be just pedantry to notice that Hamlet describes death as 'the undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns' not long after seeing his father's ghost. We are also asked to accept that Hamlet 'was likely, had he been put on, To have proved most royally;' although we have just watched him paralysed to inaction by traumatic events, acted daft in the face of it and treated his girlfriend rather abominably. We might have a Prince who is thought to be a bit like that in our country at the moment but few are suggesting that he's going to make a good king, not even his mother.

And so, not only does the question arise whether Hamlet is the best play ever written, or even Shakespeare's, but whether my mate and I, having seen 20 or more productions each of it, are still quite as enthused as we were about continuing to take every opportunity to see yet more.

I think I construct my ideal Hamlet from bits and pieces of various versions, a bit of Olivier's film in the flashback sequences, Ken Dodd as Yorick in Branagh's, superb touches locally by Southsea Shakespeare Actors like the burning of boats during 'To be or not to be', Ophelia appearing in Polonius's clothes in her mad scene or Fran Lewis who I remember and praise at every opportunity. But I can't think which was most coherent on its own.

The language is sublime, obviously, and will never be in doubt, but once expectation has been dented, doubts flood in, not single spies but in battalions.

I'm sure this production will benefit from these preview outings, in the same way that pre-season friendlies can be inconclusive affairs before a team goes unbeaten well into October in the league. And some things can be as interesting for their imperfections as for their excellence but I'm afraid you don't get rave notices for that. But, as it stood, this was in danger of being a play of shreds and patches.

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Note. I am grateful to the teenage boy who sat next to me in the front row of the circle on Friday night who desisted from playing with his empty plastic beer vessel once I had decided that I had to suggest it might be time to put it down. He apologized and that's fine. It ceased immediately. But unfortunately I'm not the sort of pro-active, Alpha-male who enjoys making such points to strangers in a public place and it took more courage to do than I thought I had.

Hamlet is a long play and I do understand that teenagers now suffer from Attention Deficit Disorder but in the same way that one shouldn't have a mobile phone switched on and, like I have to, one tries to only cough when there's a loud bit in the performance to cover it, you shouldn't be in the audience if you feel the need to fiddle irritatingly with a bit of plastic whenever 10 boring minutes pass without anybody on stage being zapped.

You don't know, spotty kid, how close you were to being the next casualty in an unscripted addition to the evening's entertainment but you desisted and apologized when asked and I wish you success in all your ongoing studies and adventures in theatre and Eng Lit.

I hope you get as much out of it all as I like to think I have.