A comedy musical by Living Spit that reimagines Hamlet as an egg named Omlet, featuring live music, puppetry and bad puns.
Living Spit bring The Tragedy of Omlet, Prince of Hen-mark to The Wardrobe Theatre from Monday 19 October, running through to Thursday 29 October. It's a brand-new comedy musical from the troupe, and if you've seen their previous work, you've got a good idea of the territory they're in. They're the names behind There's Something About Typhoid Mary, Six Wives of Henry VIII, The Passion of Living Spit and Adolf & Winston, so this sits right in their wheelhouse of irreverent, musical takes on historical and literary figures.
The premise is Hamlet reimagined as 'Hamlet rehatched'. The lead is Omlet, Prince of Hen-mark, a fragile, brooding egg on the brink of cracking under his own egg-sistential angst, surrounded by a supporting cast of vegetables and assorted foodstuffs. The book is credited to actor Stu McLoughlin and William Shakespeare, and McLoughlin is the one who carries the whole thing on stage alone. He handles the live original music, the perishable puppetry, and a heavy reliance on bad puns, juggling the Shakespearean tragedy while trying not to turn his leading man into a leading flan. It runs 100 minutes with an interval and is recommended for ages 12 and over.
Critics have described it as a 'triumph of irreverence' (Fine Times Recorder) and 'scabrous, irreverent, and filthy but with the lightness of touch of Keaton and Chaplin' (What's On Stage), which gives you a fair sense of the tone. It's a one-man show that manages to be both a nod to the original and a bit of a mess in the best possible way.
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It runs from Monday 19 October to Thursday 29 October, with half-past seven starts each night. Tickets are £15, and you'll find it at The Wardrobe Theatre, 25 West Street, BS2 0DF.
