Critics at Large | The New Yorker4 Des 2025

Does “Hamlet” Need a Backstory?

Since it was penned more than four hundred years ago, Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” has been in production nearly continuously, and has been adapted in many ways. On this episode of Critics at Large, Vinson Cunningham, Naomi Fry, and Alexandra Schwartz consider why this story of a brooding young prince has continued to speak to audiences throughout the centuries. They discuss the new film “Hamnet,” directed by Chloé Zhao, which recasts the writing of “Hamlet” as Shakespeare’s response to the death of his child; Tom Stoppard’s absurdist play “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead”; Michael Almereyda’s 2000 “Hamlet,” which presents the protagonist as a melancholy film student home from college; and other adaptations. What accounts for this story’s hold over audiences, centuries after it was written? “I think it endures because every generation has its version of the incomprehensible,” Cunningham says. “It’s not just death—it’s politics, it’s society. Everybody has to deal with their own version of ‘This does not make sense and yet it is.’ ” Read, watch, and listen with the critics: “Hamnet” (2025)“Hamnet,” by Maggie O’Farrell“Hamlet,” by William ShakespeareKenneth Branagh’s “Hamlet” (1996) Michael Almereyda’s “Hamlet” (2000)“Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” (1990)John Gielgud’s “Hamlet” (1964)Robert Icke’s “Hamlet” (2017, 2022)“Every Generation Gets the Shakespeare It Deserves” by Drew Lichtenberg (The New York Times)“Hamlet and His Problems" by T. S. Eliot New episodes drop every Thursday. Follow Critics at Large wherever you get your podcasts. Critics at Large is a weekly discussion from The New Yorker which explores the latest trends in books, television, film, and more. Join us every Thursday as we make unexpected connections between classic texts and pop culture. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(141)

Critics’ Cult Classics: Hannah Goldfield on the Food World’s Secret Tastemakers

In the second in a series of Critics at Large interview episodes devoted to the topic of cult classics, Naomi Fry talks with the New Yorker staff writer Hannah Goldfield about how that designation app...

13 Aug 39min

Critics’ Cult Classics: Hanif Abdurraqib on Camp Lo’s “Uptown Saturday Night”

When it dropped in January of 1997, Camp Lo’s “Uptown Saturday Night” thrilled some listeners and confounded others. On the first in a series of Critics at Large interview episodes devoted to resurfac...

6 Aug 46min

The Irony and the Ecstasy of Colson Whitehead

Colson Whitehead’s ascent in the literary world has seemed, like much of what he does, impressively effortless. Though he’s best known for “The Underground Railroad” and “The Nickel Boys”—both of whic...

30 Jul 50min

The Golden Age of the American Idiot

The new game show “Nation’s Dumbest,” flips the classic “Jeopardy!” script on its head. The format: twelve famous-ish contestants are peppered with basic logic and trivia questions. The twist is that ...

23 Jul 52min

Who Owns the Odyssey?

In its nearly three-thousand-year history, the Odyssey has undergone as many twists and turns as its protagonist does on his journey home to Ithaca. Its origins as oral poetry suggest countless revisi...

16 Jul 50min

An American Playlist

This week, to commemorate two hundred and fifty years of the American experiment, Vinson Cunningham, Naomi Fry, and Alexandra Schwartz present an American playlist. On this special episode, the hosts ...

2 Jul 59min

From The Political Scene: The Politics of the Big Game

Critics at Large will be back next week. In the meantime, you can hear Vinson Cunningham and Naomi Fry on a recent episode of The New Yorker’s Political Scene, hosted by Tyler Foggatt, where they cons...

25 Jun 37min

Steven Spielberg’s Blockbusters

When “Jaws” hit theatres in 1975, no one—neither the studio executives involved nor the film’s twenty-six-year-old director, Steven Spielberg—was betting on its success. But it dominated at the box of...

18 Jun 55min