Despite the commitment to Ophelia and dance, the performance starts with an actor (Aphiwe Dike) speaking Hamlet’s most famous soliloquy.  “To be or not to be.”  The actor is soon joined by the dancer Hamlet (Tumelo Lekana).  We switch to a scene, although we are set in modern day South Africa, with the backdrop of a gothic castle.  The court scene is of wild, celebratory dancing with a majestic looking, Gertrude, tall and stately clearly in charge.  Ophelia dances on her own, confused, in a spin not knowing where to go.  Hamlet, the dancer, approaches, his chest strutting out like a proud peacock, and the other male dancers copy this move.  The ghost is played as shadows on the backdrop. 

Ophelia dances with two men, one is Polonius and I think the other is Laertes (Thuso Lobeko) her brother.  Claudius enters, like Gertrude he is the tallest of the male dancers and for a crown he wears a red beret along with a gold shirt. The court copy Claudius’s moves in a deeply sexual dance.  Hamlet uses the bedroom speech comparing his father to his uncle, “like Hyperion to a Satyr,” early and in front of Claudius and the whole court.