{"id":208575,"date":"2026-04-24T17:53:31","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T17:53:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/208575\/"},"modified":"2026-04-24T17:53:31","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T17:53:31","slug":"to-be-or-not-to-be-alone-a-visceral-high-stakes-hamlet-comes-to-brooklyn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/208575\/","title":{"rendered":"To be or not to be alone: A visceral, high-stakes \u2018Hamlet\u2019 comes to Brooklyn"},"content":{"rendered":"

Operation Mincemeat director Robert Hastie and stars Hiran Abeysekara and Francesca Mills discuss redefining Shakespeare\u2019s tragedy for a surveillance-heavy world.<\/p>\n

The corridors of power will soon shift from the U.K. to Brooklyn as Robert Hastie\u2019s acclaimed production of Hamlet<\/a> arrives at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Harvey Theater from April 26 to May 17. This staging was originally developed at London\u2019s National Theatre, and Hiran Abeysekara and Francesca Mills reprise the lead roles they originated across the pond in 2025.<\/p>\n

The NYC transfer marks a meeting of major talents: Hastie returns to the director\u2019s chair after staging the hit musical Operation Mincemeat<\/a> to massive success in London and on Broadway. Meanwhile, Abeysekara is celebrated for his Olivier Award-winning performance in Life of Pi, a role he reprised for the play\u2019s Broadway run. Joining Hastie and Abeysekara is Francesca Mills, an Ian Charleson Award winner acclaimed for her performance as Hermia in A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream at Shakespeare\u2019s Globe.<\/p>\n

Written by William Shakespeare around 1600 and first performed at the turn of the 17th century, Hamlet is one of literature\u2019s most enduring tragedies. The title character (Abeysekara), the young Prince of Denmark, returns home to find his father murdered and his uncle on the throne, sparking a profound meditation on revenge, grief, and the weight of conscience. Also at the center of this turmoil is Ophelia (Mills), a young noblewoman caught between her loyalty to her family and her love for the increasingly volatile Hamlet. In Hastie\u2019s version, this classic tale of domestic betrayal is heightened by an environment where every whisper is a liability and no room is truly secure.<\/p>\n

\"2<\/p>\n

Building a cast at “the speed of thought”<\/p>\n

The impetus for Hastie’s production was the electric potential of a specific performer. \u201cThis is going to embarrass him, but it\u2019s Hiran, really,\u201d the director said of his leading man. \u201cI think you can\u2019t really do Hamlet without knowing who your Hamlet is.\u201d Abeysekara was the only actor Hastie envisioned for the role when the National Theatre first approached him to stage the play. \u201cThe reason I always thought he would be an exciting Hamlet is because of performances I\u2019d seen him give where his relationship with the audience was so immediate and direct, and playful, and mischievous, and dangerous,\u201d Hastie observed.<\/p>\n

Abeysekara felt the weight of that responsibility early on, noting that the role began to permeate his own reality. \u201cStarting Hamlet during that time, it started to really affect me in various ways of my mind and my life,\u201d Abeysekara said. He found a vital partner in Hastie, who provided the safety to explore such a volatile character. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of love in his heart, and I feel comfortable with him to try things out and fail, and not worry about it because I know that he\u2019d be there,” Abeysekara added.<\/p>\n

This culture of trust was equally essential for Mills, who described a rehearsal room where she was encouraged to experiment with the character\u2019s agency. \u201cHe\u2019s like, \u2018You\u2019ve got a chef\u2019s hat. Now, what do you want to cook up?\u2019\u201d Mills said of Hastie\u2019s directing style.<\/p>\n

This freedom allowed her to move past traditional interpretations of a tragic, passive Ophelia. \u201cI tried to start her energy really high, rather than start her down and only have a little bit of room to grow,\u201d Mills explained, adding that her Ophelia had to possess the steel to match Hamlet\u2019s intellect. \u201cYou had to show her quickness and her wickedness to be able to keep up with such a wordsmith as Hamlet.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hastie recalled the fastest audition in history when he met Mills at an awards ceremony and asked what Shakespeare she\u2019d like to do. \u201cQuick as a flash, she said she really wanted to do a turn in Hamlet,\u201d Hastie recalled.<\/p>\n

\"4<\/p>\n

A world without privacy<\/p>\n

Shakespeare\u2019s text is famously filled with eavesdropping and observation, and Hastie’s staging leans into the idea that, in a world defined by subterfuge, these characters are never truly alone. Every interaction becomes a public performance or a potential trap, a reality that’s equally dangerous for Hamlet and Ophelia.<\/p>\n

Though this Hamlet leans heavily into a spy culture that mirrors our own always-on society, Hastie avoids clich\u00e9s like CCTV cameras and flickering screens. Instead, he focuses on the human cost of living without privacy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to explore […] the more immediate, human, analog version of that and to create a world in which there are potentially people listening around corners and in rooms, and in corridors, and in doorways,\u201d Hastie explained. \u201cWhat is it like to feel that [Hamlet] can\u2019t trust a private space? And that feels like a very real thing that young people today are affected by, the inability to have a truly private space because your life is being lived and curated in public.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"1<\/p>\n

Global consequences, personal stakes<\/p>\n

The jump from individual privacy to international peril is a short one in this version. While the production remains anchored in the \u201cmessy story of a family falling apart,\u201d Hastie said, it refuses to ignore the looming threat of a neighboring invasion, a plot point often cut in other stagings.<\/p>\n

For the director, these broader stakes are a vital reminder \u201cthat the actions of individuals have global impact, and in particular, the personal relationships that are happening in the corridors of power have consequences for the lives of the people in the countries that they\u2019re at the top of.\u201d He viewed these background political events as a \u201cconstant reminder, like rolling news, that there are global consequences to the domestic drama that\u2019s playing out,\u201d Hastie said.<\/p>\n

As the cast prepares for the Brooklyn premiere, Abeysekara reflected on how the production has deepened since its initial London run. With Shakespeare\u2019s language now second nature to the actors, their delivery has moved away from the feeling of a distant classical text and into something more immediate. The speed and intensity of the performance allows the dialogue to unfold with the urgency of a real-time emergency.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe speed of thought in this production really comes directly from the text,\u201d Abeysekara said. \u201cThere is still so much to be discovered within Hamlet\u2019s world. To be honest, I think playing this part will begin a lifetime of discovery.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultimately, the team hopes New York audiences will leave the theatre feeling the deep bond shared by their ensemble. Hastie summed up the humanistic goal of this staging: \u201cI hope they\u2019ll come away feeling like they\u2019ve met and got to care for a group of real people expressing themselves in timeless language.\u201d<\/p>\n

Get Hamlet tickets<\/a> now.<\/p>\n

Photo credit: Hamlet in London. (Photos by Sam Taylor)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Operation Mincemeat director Robert Hastie and stars Hiran Abeysekara and Francesca Mills discuss redefining Shakespeare\u2019s tragedy for a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208576,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-208575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208575\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}