Hamlet goes clubbing: Berliner Ensemble restages Shakespeare in today's Germany

Shakespeare's "Hamlet" has landed in present-day Germany, and it isn't polite about it.

At the Berliner Ensemble, one of Berlin's best-known theatres, Ersan Mondtag and Wilke Weermann have moved the classic into the Germany of today. The result is a kind of theatre comic: youthful storm and sexual urge, drug paranoia and fear of war all collide on stage.

The production also drags Hamlet through the club scene. That is where one early review gets sharp. It calls the evening "very bad peasant theatre with darkroom folklore" and says there is more coke than sense.

So this is not a quiet, polite night out. Mondtag has a name for wild, provocative staging, and this version seems to divide opinion right away.

If you like your Shakespeare loud, messy and set in the here and now, it might be for you. If you prefer tights and tradition, maybe skip it.