ARTISTIC HERITAGE

HAMLET
BAILEY MAHOLM
THEATRE 3731
ACTOR TRAINING AND STYLE

• Boys performed as young female roles,

and were trained from a young age to
perform in strong male roles as they
got older.
• Actors performed in companies
known as troupes. Wealthy troupes
contained 8-12 sharers, 3-4 boys,
stagehands, and musicians.
• By the time Shakespeare died, actors
were stationed at a particular theater,
not traveling troupes.
THEATRICAL STYLES

• Presentational Acting style where the actors were aware of,

and addressed the audience.
• Actor movements were much more stylistic and dramatized.
• There was often a play within a play.
• Stock characters such as the clown were still present, but
making their way out of fashion.
• The aside, the prologue, and the soliloquy were all used
frequently, as well as easvedropping.
 SHAKESPEARE’S ARTISTIC INFLUENCERS

• Geoffrey Chaucer (1340-1400) middle English

poet, author of The Canterbury Tales
• Plutarch (46-120) AD famous writer of Parallel
Lives which Shakespeare used to write Julius
Caesar
• Christopher Marlowe
• Stories, fables, tales, etc.
• The Tempest, A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream, and
Love Labour’s Lost are the only 3 Shakespearean
texts known to be original.
 • Stratford upon Avon- The town in which Shakespeare
was born in raised had contextual and artistic influence
on his works.
ARTISTIC
• The Renaissance- the period in which Shakespeare
INSPIRATION started writing held a lot of weight on his writings,
ON including period based pieces.
SHAKESPEARE’S • The Bible- not only is there a heavy influence of God
PLAYS in Shakespeare’s plays, but there are also many
allusions to the stories in the Bible.
• Past stories and plays
 INFLUENCES ON
THE TEXT OF
HAMLET

• Catholicism- The Ghost of

Hamlet’s father.
• Saxo the Grammarian’s Hamlet-
The original story of Hamlet
• His son? Shakespeare had a son
named Hamnet who he buried a
few years before writing Hamlet.
SOURCES CITED

• http://www.thedramateacher.com/elizabethan-theatre-
conventions/
• http://www.shakespeare-
online.com/faq/shakespeareinspired.html
• http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/uploads/files/2014/01/acto
rs.pdf
• http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2004/10/21/the-death-of-
hamnet-and-the-making-of-hamlet/