James Ijames has made several of his plays as adaptations or responses to other pieces. For Fat Ham, he turned his curiosity to one of the most famous and influential plays of the English language: Shakespeare’s tragedy, Hamlet.
If you’re a hardcore Shakespeare nerd, you’ll find plenty of gifts and provocations in here. If you’re newer to Hamlet, here are a few things to keep an eye (and ear) out for:
The Inciting Incident. In both plays, the inciting incident is the same: Hamlet and Juicy are both visited by the ghost of their father, asking for his death to be avenged.
Shared Soliloquies. James Ijames has used some of Shakespeare’s original text, including the famous “the play’s the thing” monologue. Ijames says, “I wasn’t going to write a better version of ‘This is what we’re about to do. We’re going to put on an act to make someone confess they’re a murderer.’”
About that Play-Within-a-Play. Hamlet tries to figure out whether his uncle is guilty by writing a play for a group of traveling performers to perform for the court. The play shows a man murdering his brother. Hamlet hopes that he’ll be able to tell whether Claudius is guilty in how he responds to the play. In Fat Ham, Juicy suggests that everyone play charades, and puts his own pointed addition into the mix. (You’ll have to wait to see what it is.)
The Audience is There. Hamlet “breaks the fourth wall” by delivering his soliloquies directly to the audience–such as “to be or not to be.” Juicy addresses the audience in a similar way.
Tragedy but Make it Funny. Fat Ham takes some of the better-known tragic lines and turns them comic. “Ay, there’s the rub” in the original is about Hamlet contemplating suicide. In Fat Ham, it becomes about barbeque–the seasoning one rubs on meat.
Parallels That Diverge. The plot of Fat Ham stays close to Hamlet at the beginning, but then veers wildly and creatively away from the original. Shakespeare’s Hamlet is decidedly tragic, and the play ends with the death of almost every character. Ijames takes on some of the same important themes but gives his character a fighting chance of survival.
—Monica Flory
James Ijames on choosing to adapt Hamlet:
“I always think of Hamlet as a Cain and Abel story: the story of a sibling killing their sibling to get ahead. Anybody can relate to that; that’s a [narrative] that you inherit and moves with you through generations. And the younger folks in the play have to make some decisions about whether or not they want to continue that, whether that’s what they want their lives to look like and their relationships to each other to look like. I’m calling into question the stories that we’ve been passed down as wisdom. Because sometimes it’s wisdom, but more and more I look at those stories as cautionary tales of what you shouldn’t do. Vengeance isn’t gonna help Juicy. Killing his uncle is not gonna help Juicy’s life get any better.”