Overview

• The production launched the Deutsches Schauspielhaus season on Friday night in Hamburg.
• Castorf overlays Shakespeare with Heiner Müller's Die Hamletmaschine to link the story to twentieth-century violence, totalitarianism and imperial ambitions.
• The staging unfolds on a black-stone battlefield with a bunker, weaving in references to Dante and Artaud and using live video on a giant screen.
• Reviews clock the runtime at just over six hours, noting a cohesive first half and a sprawling, sometimes unruly second part.
• Performances draw praise, with Paul Behren’s driven, melancholic Hamlet and Lilith Stangenberg’s potent Ophelia highlighted, alongside Josef Ostendorf as Claudius and Angelika Richter as Gertrude.