Collaboration with Thom Yorke is worth hype in tragedy played with clarity and verve
In all the hype around the collaborators on this co-production between the Royal Shakespeare Company and Factory International, it is easy to forget what is at its centre. It is not the co-directors, Steven Hoggett and Christine Jones, despite CVs that stretch from American Idiot to Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. It is not even Thom Yorke, the Radiohead frontman who has gutted and repurposed the band’s doomy 2003 album Hail to the Thief for the show’s soundtrack.
No, it is a 425-year-old play by William Shakespeare – and a startling performance by Samuel Blenkin as the bereaved prince, who does indeed have as much to rail against the world about as Yorke and his band did in the aftermath of 9/11 and the ascendency of George W Bush.
At Aviva Studios, Manchester, until 18 May; at Royal Shakespeare Company, Stratford Upon Avon, 4–28 June
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