Type – Shakespeare, One-Person Performance
If you liked – Hamlet Camp, Ian McKellen’s Acting Shakespeare, Hamlet
Izzard: The Tragedy of Hamlet: Pure mental and physical stamina is placed centre stage in a masterful piece of storytelling. If Shakespeare is your thing, then this is one to invest in.
Not only is William Shakespeare‘s Hamlet his longest play, it’s also regarded as one of the most challenging due to the amount and length of soliloquies written for its titular character, the Danish Prince Hamlet. So when you hear that Eddie Izzard is set to perform her one-woman Hamlet at the Sydney Opera House, you’d be forgiven for assuming that it must surely be an abridged version given the 20-something characters throughout the famously dense dialogue. You’d also be forgiven for being entirely wrong in that assumption.
Izzard performs the entirety of Shakespeare’s Hamlet across the course of two-ish hours – don’t worry, there’s an interval. In terms of its abridgement, this is only minor. There’s a few lines removed, cut short, altered, and edited for ease, but otherwise it’s all there. “Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue.”
In full transparency, I came in woefully underprepared. My brain was not mentally ready for this singularity in performance, so for the first few scenes I struggled to get on board with the concept. It may also help you to know that I’m a massive Hamlet nut – so my expectations for any version of the text is already trepidacious.
Izzard performs on a blank canvas. The stage is bare, the lighting state is unchanged throughout, her costume remains the same. The only light thrown onto the canvas is a single strand of downward light on the back wall, and two parcans on either side of the stage. The challenge Izzard presents is how she is able to inhabit the world of Hamlet. She rests on pure storytelling.
And, as a piece of storytelling…she succeeds.
Despite my apprehension for the first little while, Izzard’s masterful touch and familiarity with the text ultimately guided me into the journey. I remembered why I love this text so much. As Izzard tells us – breaking the fourth wall immediately upon entry, high heeled boots gracefully sweeping the stage, hair in a tight ponytail – this is about a family tearing itself apart, in a country tearing itself apart. That sentiment alone reverberates outside the Opera House walls.
What Izzard’s The Tragedy of Hamlet gains in its pure Shakespearean mental stamina of the solo performance, it also loses in emotional depth however. The torment of Hamlet never fully feels gutteral, the decaying mental state of Ophelia never quite feels deep enough, and the grief of Laertes feels more fleeting than reflective of Hamlet himself.
But it’s also not without Izzard’s penchant for comedy. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s representation continues the trend of reducing them to the butt of a joke (thanks Stoppard), and Polonius’ obtuse pompousness is a sharp break in levity.
Is The Tragedy of Hamlet Worth Seeing in Sydney?
How much you get out of The Tragedy of Hamlet will depend on how much you’re willing to invest. If you’re an eager fan of the bard who wants to see a masterful piece of performance and stamina utilising one of Shakespeare’s most famous texts, then it’s a must. If you have a dalliance with Shakespeare every now and then and require more bodies on stage in your theatre, then you may be better going over the wharf to Bell Shakespeare’s latest.
What is undeniable, is that you’ll never have seen Hamlet performed this way in your life.
Tickets and Practical Info for The Tragedy of Hamlet in Sydney 🎟️
Until 21st June
The Playhouse, Sydney Opera House
Tickets: https://www.sydneyoperahouse.com/theatre/izzard-hamlet
Adapted by Mark Izzard and directed by Selina Cadell.
EVENT DETAILS:
WHAT: Izzard: The Tragedy of Hamlet
WHEN: 9 – 21 June 2026
WHERE: Playhouse, Sydney Opera House
TICKETS: From $89.90 + booking fee
