First Impressions: Hamlet at Rep Stage

That's one intense young man.

Karl Miller's Hamlet is so tightly wound he flinches--hell, he practically levitates--when anybody touches him. A hand on the shoulder, and the convulsion starts in his solar plexus, pulling his body in, as if around a giant knot in his stomach. He's eating the language alive, too.

I wish the production around him were as consistently watchable. The two refugees from what would appear to be a kegger at the Alpha Gamma Rosencrantz house are good fun ... that flash of unexpected levity in the Mousetrap sequence, ditto. But the Ophelia scenes (mostly) and the Claudius confessional and the graveside brawl come across like so much stagy business; the shivers aren't there.

I liked:
-- the way Gertrude's over-the-top train morphs into the hangings in her bedroom, then into a shroud for you-know-who
-- what Miller does with that skull ... [shudder] Alas poor Yorick, indeed
-- the bit of staging that lets us see Ophelia's drowning

Not so much:
-- the way that drowning bit steals focus from Gertrude, who deserves the chance to show her humanity in that speech

(UPDATE, March 31: The official word is here.

Now playing on Tboy's iTunes: Baby You Belong from the album "Cry" by Faith Hill.

Comments

[Darius S.]

Why does everyone think Karl Miller is so great? He's a sullen, waifish wraith in every single role... boring choices and is just being himself plus new words.

Lame.

[mg]

You obviously didn't see "Accidental Death of an Anarchist." Either that, or you're bitter you weren't in it.

[dcepticon]

You know there is a difference between being yourself and being real. Karl is one of the smartest and sincere people I know. And every bit of that appears on stage. He makes choices based on thought and feeling. If he happens to be cast as young pensive men, its because that is the way he is cast. I would rather watch him than most of the preening nonsense that passes for acting in this town and that includes myself from time to time.

[sas]

Good Lord who are you people? (Darius, that is, not the follow-ups.)

I have to confess. Whenever one of these comments pops up on theaterboy, maligning a very successful member of the DC theater community, I have this image in my head of a dark, smoky room where these commenters sit all day stewing over the fact that other people are getting work and they are not, eating toast and rice because there is so much bile in their stomachs that this is all they can actually digest, alternating between drawing mustaches and devil horns on Karl Miller and Kim Schraf's (and all the others who have received misguided digs here) headshots and dreaming up nasty little statements to post on theaterboy.

It seems to me if they spent half as much time trying to do whatever it is they want to do (write? act? direct? produce?) as they do spewing vitriol at those who are actually doing what they want to do, they might even contribute something worthwhile to the theater community.

[theaterboy]

SAS:

I'd like to suggest that the "Darius S." who's commented on Mr. Miller's style may not, in fact, be the Darius S. who was recently the subject of another post.

I know, for instance, that the e-mail address attached to the above comment is not the same as the one that I've been using to correspond with Darius Suziedelis.

Just so's you know...

[sas]

And I, for one, didn't even make that connection. And in no way meant to suggest a connection. Thanks T-boy, for the clarification.

[Mb]

i heart sas.

[Darius]

Ok, now I remember why I don't read blogs: public comment lists. Too many opportunities for very sad and bored idiots to post random rants and insults.

But now I'm more than annoyed. It seems someone wanted to be cute in their earlier comment about Karl Miller by posting under the name "Darius S." using an email that approximates mine.

For the record, I have nothing but the highest respect for Karl Miller's work on stage - a tremendous talent that enriches DC theater. End of story.

And for the patethic f*ck who hides behind other actors' names and emails... how completely sad is it to be you?

Thanks theaterboy for alerting me to this.

Darius Suziedelis

[dramaturg boy]

Apart from the whole using-someone-else's-name business, pseudo-Darius gives away his agenda in his first sentence: "Why does everyone think Karl Miller is so great?" Because by and large I would say that people in fact DO think that, and it appears that that is what has gotten p-D's knickers in a twist. Yes, he then gets to a complaint about Karl's performances, but the chief irritant is already laid out there.

How many actors does it take to change a light bulb? 100. One to do it, and 99 to mutter, "I could have done that better."

It's hard to say why an actor's popularity would bother anyone so much unless he is an actor himself (or herself). So pseudo-Darius, if that's so, I'd suggest you take your rages at Karl's frequent casting, popularity, and good reviews and channel them into your own work. Prove to the rest of the world that it's wrong about Karl and that you really should have played all those roles.

That's not to say that you're not entitled to your opinions, but as subjective observations, they don't move me in any way because they contradict what I've seen. Maybe you'd prefer an actor who's a showy chameleon-- fine. But that's not a reasonable judgement of Karl's performances, it's merely an expression of the fact that you want to see something else. And a critic, anonymous or otherwise, should be able to tell the difference between what he hoped to see, and what he does see. Not to mention being able to judge when there's a difference between what he personally likes and what is good.

[still alert]

While Mr. Miller probably does not need more defending than appears in the above comments, I must put in two more francs. Though he is often cast these days in roles which are similar in age and approach, this was not at all the case the first time I saw this unusual actor.

Fully four summers ago, in a corner of the Clark Street Playhouse's prop warehouse/scene shop/rat haven, about an hour into a provocative production of a modern French classic, the back wall flew open, a blaze of light blinded the audience, and down the loading dock ramp swept a divinely eccentric unknown named Karl Miller, in full drag and spouting a non-stop torrent of dialogue, in French.

An already exciting production of Genet's "The Maids" was electrified by Miller's flamboyant yet grounded performance as the Mistress.

It was neither sullen, waifish, nor lame.

It was, in fact, astonishing.

[ChristopherHenley]

Excellent point, Still Alert.

My this week's NEW YORK magazine came yesterday; (pre-9/11, it used to come of a Tuesday...) it was great to see not only a nice big picture of Karl in Columbinus, but also to read the full paragraph in the review devoted to his performance. Check it out:
http://nymag.com/arts/theater/reviews/17184/