Hamlet

About

Director Krzysztof Warlikowski offers a psychoanalytic reading of Ambroise Thomas’s opera, presented here in the rare tenor version of the title role. The staging concentrates on Hamlet’s inner life rather than historical events, showing him trapped within memories and obsessions as he continuously relives the trauma of his father’s murder. Urged on by the spectre of the dead king to avenge the crime, Hamlet emerges as a great tragic figure who cannot exist independently of his parents and their fate. His impossible emancipation from the father figure distorts his relationship with his mother, confronting him with a Freudian Oedipal tension between filial love and desire. While rooted in the codes of French grand opera — five acts, ballet, and expansive orchestral and choral forces — Warlikowski’s production reshapes the form to foreground psychological depth. The creative team includes sets and costumes by Małgorzata Szczęśniak, lighting by Felice Ross, and video by Denis Guéguin.