Hamlet
Written by William Shakespeare; Directed by Claudia Maurino & Ivy Linden-Dionne, A Strange Fish Production
Court Square Theatre | 44-02 23rd Street, Long Island City, NY 11101
September 23, 2026 - September 26, 2026
Joyful exuberance filled the room the The Court Square Theatre this week with Stange Fish Production’s Hamlet. This troupe of players gave us their stylized Shakepseare with their whirlwinds of passion and suited the the action to the word, and the word to the action. With a production team that partly doubled in the cast, these are the sorts of cohorts that excite theatregoers as they see what is coming next.
Each production of Hamlet is going to focus on a different aspect of the much-beloved story and try to answer the question of Hamlet’s motives. It seems that this directing team (Claudia Maurino and Ivy Linden-Dionne) wanted to focus on the potential madness of Hamlet, played here by Kaliska Wiley, and the danger that brings.
Wiley’s Hamlet was definitely mad, frantic, manic even in their speeches. Sometimes you could see her trying to keep Hamlet calm, but there’s nothing calm in the sea of troubles in her Hamlet. There was always a danger there that Hamlet would go off the rails and murder everyone around her, and that kept this audience member attentive.
In contrast to that, Kade Clarks’s Claudius was incredibly grounded and charming, even. I actually liked Claudius this go ‘round and could not conceive a world where he would kill his brother for the power of the throne and the hand of Gertrude (Christine Strong). I can honestly say that this is the first production of Hamlet where I asked myself “Did Claudius really kill the king? What if Hamlet killed his father?” as that’s where this production was leading me. There would need to be some interesting cutting, especially from Claudius’s lines, should that ever be the desire of a company.
A particular delight in this company was Darrow Sherman as the First Player. One could sense that Darrow, who was a multihyphenate actor-composer-sound designer-assistant fight choreographer, was a true leader of the troupe both on stage and off. Their presence demanded attention and kept it whether they were giving a monologue or playing the banjo. Anant Joshi’s Laertes was filled with a righteous anger at the untimely death of his parent Polonius and later sister Ophelia, while Horatio (Izze Clark) gave the audience a touchpoint, a person to cling to as they opened and closed the show as the only cast member not to play a character falling to a foul and most unnatural murder.
At intermission, my companion and I both remarked how much we wanted to live in the costumes of this production. Designed by Annie Gallivan (who also played a concerned Ophelia), the costumes were incredibly fun and the part of the play that leaned the most towards the commedia dell’arte style we were promised. We both really loved Hamlet’s shirt of diamond-shaped leather, the tights on Rosencrantz (Bernadette Harding) and Guildenstern (Ruby Vanhouten), and the Perriot-inspired look for Polonius (Kate Shoulders).
While the actors made the best use of the stage and some of the odd entrances that The Court Square Theatre Provides, the directors had their hands full trying to get their players on and off the stage. Many times, after exiting off the raised platform, the actors had to sneak behind the last row of the audience to get back stage in the near black lighting, and rather than having action happening onstage to keep my focus, I found myself with nothing to watch on stage and drifting toward people trying not to be seen while we waited for their exeunt. Maybe the commedia was in the exits.
Review by Trey Radu-Blackburn
Published by Theatre Beyond Broadway on September 26, 2026. All rights reserved.