I spent the day teaching a group of people who are learning how to be teachers. It’s funny how a group of people can so quickly get on board and do whatever you ask them.

But, of course, that is a skill, that instant getting on board-ness. Not every person can do it. It’s a practice and a conscious effort, really. After so many years of doing it, it can seem like a given, like it takes no effort at all to buy in. But of course there are mountains of effort behind it. . . they’ve just already been climbed.

And were there command performances for just one person?

Like, when the Players are commissioned for The Mousetrap, they could be preparing to perform just for Hamlet – would that happen?

We know it’s not so here, as the whole plot hinges on Hamlet getting a particular audience in the room but are there Princes who just want to watch a show by themselves?

I imagine it doesn’t happen much, given how rare ACTUAL solitude would be for royalty. Even if you watched a play alone, you probably also have a handful of staff on hand. And if any dignitaries are around, it would be awfully rude to have a show and not invite them over to watch it.

So performing before a royal personage, as much as it sounds like performing for one person is likely to be a roomful.

This is one of the things Art does. It is not simply the work itself (though the work itself can bring joy) but the anticipation of the work. There is the play itself and there is the excitement before the play. In some cases, the pre-show anticipation is better than the play. And in others, the reverse.

Of course, as an artist, I often forget to look forward to seeing things. I get caught up in obligation, in seeing work out of duty, rather than pleasure. But there are the occasional performances that reignite that joy and keep it alight with the pay off. Kafka’s Monkey, for example, I looked forward to with great eagerness and had my expectations met and then exceeded. Told by an Idiot’s production of Casanova, Improbable’s Satyagraha, Complicite’s Mneumonic, Kneehigh’s Brief Encounter, Rapunzel and The Wild Bride, Theatre de le Jeune Lune’s The Miser, the Escapist’s Boy Girl Wall, Young Jean Lee’s The Shipment and so on.

And in a way, because I am so jaded and because of how often I roll my eyes at whatever production is announced, the joy of hearing about things I actually want to see is sweeter and more precious. Especially when they deliver the anticipated good work.

This is not what I think of when I hear over-raught. I guess I think of overwrought – which would mean something quite different from overtake, which is what I think Rosencrantz means here. And I suppose they “over-raught” the players because the players were laden down with props and costumes and things.

In the film of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, they have a cart that turned into a stage (a cart which I envied, by the way.) I may be conflating the Tom Stoppard play with a film clip of Ariana Mnoushkin’s Moliere because I envied their stage carts as well. And while one of those carts would likely slow you down on the road, I do fantasize about having one. About Just chucking it all and hitting the road with a stage-cart and a jolly brand of colleagues. Never pay rent again just sleep on the stage. Snore happily while people like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern hurry past.

What’s funny about this line (aside from how horribly awful and awkward it is to say “niggard” on stage despite its not being what it sounds like) is how full of questions Hamlet actually was. He asks them all kinds of questions about what they’re doing there, about the nature of their visit, who sent them and soon. So Rosencrantz is really spinning this out.

Did they make any demands? Barely. Hamlet ran their entire exchange. Rosencrantz seems to be lying to the King and Queen. Gutsy Rosencrantz.