Benedict Cumberbatch Electrifies London in Hamlet Opening

Benedict Cumberbatch has received mixed reviews of his debut as Hamlet, with comments on the performance ranging from “electrifying” to lacking “subtlety”. Or at least so say (most) if the reviews of Cumberbatch’s Hamlet – widely considered to be one of the toughest parts to play.

And while the other reviews of Wednesday’s show were highly complementary, Twitter has been alight with upset fans, actors, journalists and theatre producers, all upset with how Cumberbatch has been treated.

Conversely, The Times Kate Malby gave it a paltry two stars describing it as a “pure, theatrical self-indulgence”.

But all of that was thrown out of the window last night, as Benedict Cumberbatch took to the stage at London’s Barbican for the first public performance of his Hamlet.

In the Daily Telegraph, Serena Davis writes that director Turner and designer Es Devlin have “created a lavish, epic Hamlet for the Barbican’s vast stage”. She also condemns the “indefensible” decision to open with Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” soliloquy, which is not repeated, in sequence, at the right emotional moment.

“Not perhaps since it held the barricades of revolution for the first performances of Les Miserables in the Eighties has this platform seemed quite so large”. This was only the opening night, and much will change and develop throughout the play’s long run. “He already commands and surprises, there are laughs and shocks, and with a cast that includes the always moving and intelligent Ciaran Hinds as Hamlet’s murdering uncle Claudius, he is ably supported”.