Hamlet is staging the play; not just the play-within-the-play, but the whole play. In the “or” of “to be or not to be,” Hamlet casts surrogate actors as herself to play out the revenge narrative. To exist is to perform relentlessly, and to perform at all is to perform madness; it is to survive, to imagine a revolution of the rift between thought and action. Death is a tropical vacation where you can finally begin to exist. The audience’s arrival is the first ghost appearance in this compression chamber of institutional geometry. As Shakespeare’s text possesses us all, the repetition of the act of performance breaks down the containers of character, play, and the proscenium. The ensemble of thirteen amnesiac clowns invites the audience to perform the mad language of love with them.

California Institute of the Arts

Directed by Scarlett Kim
Lighting Design by Dylan Phillips
Scenic Design by Alex Grover
Costume Design by X Hill
Sound Design by Malik Drawhorn-Pauldon
Original Music by Michael Zasadzinski
Video Design by Chris Kim

Performances by: AJ Delaire, Sam Camp, Sam Garnett, Chance Lang, Dante Rossi, Dan Strausman, Liam O’Donnell, Qi Bao, Lauren Baker, Tori Danner, Caleb Fietsam, Nic Prior, Rishi Mukherjee

Photography by: Brian Hashimoto and Scarlett Kim