Watercolor of Hamlet as he stabs Polonius, 19th century, by Coke Smyth (Photo: Folger Shakespeare Library)
As a savvy and skilled showman who knew what Elizabethan audiences wanted, Shakespeare put death center stage. Fans at the Globe applauded the final exits of a long line of doomed characters who were stabbed, poisoned, smothered, hanged, cut to pieces (then baked into a pie), swallowed hot coals, or even died of shame. And those are only a few of the theatrical demises devised by Shakespeare.
Carol Ann Lloyd-Stanger, visitor education programs manager at the Folger Shakespeare Library, considers three tragedies in which death is a major character: Julius Caesar, Hamlet, and Titus Andronicus. She screens clips of productions and explores some of the special effects used in Shakespeare’s time to keep audiences coming back—everything from blood-soaked dummies to bladders filled with sheep’s blood.
Then classical actor, teaching artist, and dramaturge Cam Magee takes the stage with actors who reveal how performers prepare for and act out complex Shakespearian death scenes. (For example, how do you approach a character who simply won’t shut up and die?) The evening ends with an extravaganza of tragic deaths. You might even exit the theater “pursued by a bear.”
Other Connections
Shakespeare loved actors—he was one himself—and gave them plenty of juicy death scenes. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, he went one better: We see actors playing amateur actors (not very skilled ones) as they present “The Most Lamentable Comedy and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisbe.” Thisbe’s death is indeed lamentably comic, but Sam Rockwell’s performance in the 1999 film adaptation adds a surprising dimension to this gem of a scene.
