EMU students Matt Andersen and Evan Mann share the title role in "Hamlet."

photo courtesy of EMU

Leave it to Eastern Michigan University theater professor Lee Stille to apply method to “Hamlet”’s madness.

While adapting William Shakespeare’s classic play over the last two years, he listened to the insights of EMU students enrolled in a dramaturgy class focused on “Hamlet,” and developed his own guiding vision for the production he’s now directing.

Stille has previously adapted several novels for the stage (and directed plenty of Shakespeare plays, of course), but this is the first time he’s adapted the work of Shakespeare — a seemingly daunting task for even a seasoned theater artist.

“Oh, yes,” Stille agreed. “One day, you get into rehearsal, and you just weep because what you’re watching is so beautiful and so horrifying. And then another night, you watch and think, ‘Eh, that really doesn’t work.’ … This play is a beast.”

Stille decided to approach “Hamlet” from “a power dominance vs. subservient survival paradigm.” The play’s basic story remains the same: Hamlet, the prince of Denmark, ruminates about getting revenge on his uncle the king, who murdered his own brother, Hamlet’s father, in order to ascend to the throne and marry Hamlet’s mother, Queen Gertrude.

What’s different in Stille’s “Hamlet” is the edited play’s points of emphasis; tone (“I don’t see the comedy in these characters that others do,” said Stille); and one highly unusual casting/staging choice.

“I cracked Hamlet into two personas,” said Stille, who consequently cast two actors in the role. “One can always be seen by the other characters on stage, and then, they tag-team at times. Sometimes, they’re at odds with each other. … This fractured persona is how (Hamlet) survives and tries to work through what’s happening to him.”

This plays in to how people often adapt when in desperate circumstances.

“When someone’s world is overthrown, the people who are being dominated, the ones at the bottom, have to learn to survive, and often, they develop a kind of dual identity to do that,” said Stille. “One that they display in public, and one that’s raging inside and wants to rebel. … Most of Hamlet’s speeches, and most of his interactions with other characters, have these magnificent eruptions where he’s warring with himself.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, Stille has held a few rehearsals with just the two actors playing Hamlet, in order to parse the character’s lines and explore its flavor and meaning.

And in terms of the production’s look, Stille explained, “The set was envisioned as a rupture in this well-ordered space. … Hamlet feels (the rupture), he sees it. He doesn’t know where it’s coming from, but he’s trying to examine it. … So most of the action takes place around a rupture in the middle of this checkerboard tile stage.”

Costumes will be deliberately anachronistic, meanwhile, combining controlled Victorian elements with rebellious Bohemian punk. In this way, Stille resists setting the play in a specific era.

“When I see a play transported to specific milieu, I feel an inevitable reduction of the text,” said Stille. “But I don’t think this (adaptation) is about simplifying. It’s about expanding. One line can take you so many places.”

Jenn McKee is the entertainment digital journalist for AnnArbor.com. Reach her at jennmckee@annarbor.com or 734-623-2546, and follow her on Twitter @jennmckee.