Forget reimaginings and modernisations - Hamlet House of Horror takes the bad Quarto in a vicelike grip and shakes it until there’s nothing left but life, noise, and fun. Part Rocky Horror, part vaudeville, part just bloody good, this is one adaptation of Shakespeare at the Fringe that works for its ticket price. My notes say: amazing.With magnificently mad and moody hair and costumes, and a catchy original soundtrack (just ask anyone next to them on the Mile), this show has to be seen to be believed. This is no Hamlet that suffers under the weight of its own fame and familiarity - the play seems new, lively, and genuinely funny. Katy Bulmer is particularly brilliant as Gravedigger 1 and Polonius bringing out the comedy of her speeches with ease, and performing a brilliant (if slightly overlong) piece of stand-up half way through the play.Winning touches and characters permeate the entire play. Lighting is used to marvellous effect; the ghost scenes succeeded where many professional attempts have failed. The play-in-a-play scene becomes a vaudeville-style clown act: funny, endearing, and inventive. Again and again, the audience are delighted by new things to look, laugh, and gasp at.The one thing lacking from this production is emotional depth. However zany you make it, Hamlet still wants to be a tragedy; whilst it is great to see the title character in Act 1 throwing his teenage Jedward-haired head down on a table, there is little effort to flesh out his or any other characters’ personalities. Most of the time neither this nor the style jars with the text, but in moments like Ophelia’s madness scene it does. It’s the lack of emotional punch which stops this brilliant and inventive production from being five stars.
