Mother’s Admiration: Part Two – The Sequel
You thought you saw it all in the first one. You thrilled at a mother admiring her son. Audiences cheered for the thrilling story. Now the wildly popular film returns to cinemas this spring for an exciting return to the world so beloved and admired by mothers and their children around the world.
Mother’s Admiration. The Sequel.
O wonderful son, that can so ‘stonish a mother!
Can’t every son ‘stonish his mother? Isn’t that just how parenting works sometimes? First, simply by being born. That is amazing in and of itself.
My friend came to town with her husband and baby boy. Over dumplings on the Upper West Side, she marveled at her son and then marveled at her own marveling. She was simultaneously convinced that her boy was the most admirable baby in the world and aware that every parent is built to feel this way about their child. She knew it was unremarkable to find her son so remarkable but found him remarkable nonetheless.
As we grow, we likely become less astonishing, less surprising or amazing to our parents – or maybe, sometimes, we continue to astonish, to amaze – simply by continuing to exist as someone’s child, someone’s remarkable baby, all grown up.
Then thus she says: your behavior hath struck her into amazement and admiration.
I fail to understand exactly what Hamlet has done from his mother’s perspective. He’s not guiltless, certainly. He orchestrated that whole show with the distinct purpose of upsetting his uncle – but Gertrude very likely doesn’t know that. Why would she blame Hamlet for Claudius’ response to a work of art? Would she blame him for his uncle’s distress at watching a ballet or looking at a painting? What exactly is this behavior that the Queen is so astonished by? Being giddy and enthusiastic at a show?
Flirting with Ophelia?
Talking during a play?
I mean, that IS bad behavior. If I have students who talk through a show, I might have a chat with them about their behavior. I suspect, though, that this is not what Gertrude is upset about.
But what?
But what?
My mother you say –
They said heaps of nice things about her. They made her two cakes. They decorated a seemingly undecoratable conference room. They issued Resolutions and Proclamations. They made slide shows and videos. They took photos. They proclaimed it all over town for a week. When they met me, they told me how great she was. And while I always said, “I know,” I’m not sure I really did. I learned things about her style and her skill at work that I had no idea about before. Most moving was the way so many women thanked her for inspiring them, for mentoring them, for being a great role model.
I wasn’t surprised, exactly. But it’s like looking at a prism from another angle, it refracts light in a different way than you’d seen it previously.
Therefore no more, but to the matter.
When I was in my early twenties, I had an acute sense of my own mortality. When I quit a terrible job at an exploitative theatre, I told the artistic director that I didn’t have time to waste at his theatre, because I was going to die. Not any time soon, mind you, but I knew I didn’t have time to waste. I think, too, it wasn’t just my mortality I was aware of, it was also my youth. As a young actor, I knew most of my value as a performer depended on my being young and attractive. I had a sense that I didn’t have that many marketable years. If I wanted to play Juliet, I had to get out and do it as soon as possible. I figured I didn’t have too many Juliet years in me.
Somewhere in the middle, probably at the point I slid past my Juliet years, I lost my hurry to beat death. Maybe it’s that having lived a few decades, I started to take them for granted. Sure, I was going to die – but that eventuality is probably (hopefully) just as far away as my birth at this point. Life started to feel long. And maybe that grind kicked in – a sense of the relentlessness of no money, an unchanging sense of the landscape, a reduction of hope. . .it can make that hurry to get it all done before I get in the ground feel a little less urgent. I started lollygagging a little bit, started messing around on the internet, started playing videogames. What’s the rush? It’ll always be this, won’t it? Grinding struggle, an endless stream of rejections. . .it is just going on and on and on.
But. No more.
I invoke my twenty two year old self and aim myself to the matter.
But, sir, such answer as I can make, you should command; or rather, as you say, my mother.
Is Hamlet poking at Guildenstern’s status here? I mean, really, as the Prince, Hamlet should really only be commanded by his mother and the King. And maybe God or something.
So – is he, like, suggesting that Guildenstern is being out of line in trying to tell him what to do? Guildenstern is definitely being a twit in the scene, so it’s rather satisfying to watch Hamlet stick it to him in whatever way he can.
My wit’s diseased.
Sometimes I can be as sharp as a tack and get a whole lot of zingers in. In the right crowd, I can be the funny one. I won’t let an opening pass me by and I see all of them.
And then – in other circumstances, I won’t say a word. Not only will I let an opportunity for wit pass me by, I won’t even see the opportunity. It can feel like my wit has been severely compromised, like it’s home sick with the flu.
I suspect it is all a matter of the audience and participants in a conversation. Where the audience is receptive and embraces me warmly, I can throw out jokes like they’re going out of style. Where the audience is not so keen on me or where there are already many people catching every opening that passes by I can barely get a word in edgewise. And so my wit bundles up in bed with a bowl of chicken soup and hopes to get back to work tomorrow.
Make you a wholesome answer.
Sometimes I know what I’m supposed to say. I know I should be declaring how important my work, how brilliant I am, how things are going great. I know I’m meant to be promoting my amazingness but I have this truth telling problem.
Which is The Wholesome Answer? The truth? Or the projected image of what we’d like the truth to be. . .the one that is meant to get me closer to that.
Which is the right one? I know which one is expected and I know which one feels right.
What, my lord?
Why does Rosencrantz cut in here? Guildenstern seems to be handling this conversation on his own and then now Rosencrantz decides to join in?Guildenstern has been all “me” and “I” and “my affair” and not “our affair” or “us” or “we” but suddenly Rosencrantz is all in it.
Is there something going on between Rosencrantz and Guildenstern? Or has Guildenstern become disgusted and stepped away somehow? What’s going on with these two?
Sir, I cannot.
The days that I cannot find a moment to write are rare. Usually, I can massage the day to fit my will – to squeeze at least a small window to write in.Today, the day has spiraled out away from me such that I am grabbing just minutes between things.
Today – I try to write but sir, I cannot.
The Hamlet Project 