II.ii. The Players - Zeffirelli '90

Structurally, Zeffirelli's version continues to distance itself from other Hamlet. The Players are not, in this case, announced by Polonius. Pete Postlethwaite (First Player) arrives with his troupe, wagon and pack animals, interrupting Hamlet and R&G's gloomy picnic. They are dirty, "medieval peasants", and come with circling seagulls that evoke the stench of humanity and the garbage it leaves behind. Does this work against the play's intent? In a way it does, reducing the Player King's mirror nobility which one could argue should outshine Claudius'. It seems to comment negatively on the Players themselves. On the other hand, it draws parallels with the worm-eating beggar of Hamlet's parable, widens the divide between the pampered nobility of the court and the rotting Denmark "out there", supports Polonius' impression that they "deserve less", and, when the mirror is finally held up to the King, intensifies the irony.

In any case, Hamlet is ebulliant and calls them "masters". The scene then cuts to Hamlet entering Elsinore with the troupe, wearing a costume and playing music. He is part of this troupe, and their festive joy us contagious. Even the villains are smiling and laughing. This is how things could be between Claudius and Hamlet if not for the regicide that stands between them. Again, irony is intensified, and one could even imagine a reading of Hamlet in which Denmark is not rotting because its King is corrupt, but rather because it hangs on its true ruler (the Prince)'s every mood (as Gertrude does). Denmark is in a sorry state because Hamlet is depressed, and here the entire citizenry shares in his moment of joy. When Hamlet falls, so too does Denmark, at the hands of Fortinbras. It's Denmark-as-Hamlet by way of Gertrude-as-Denmark. We're told she lives and dies by his looks, and so too does the country. It's an interpretation that could be used to explain how she knows so much about Ophelia's suicide (she IS the river as much as the rest of the land), and turns the closet scene into a public accusation forcing an entire country to face the fact they happily let a pretender on the throne. And after all, if Claudius is not the rightful King, and perhaps the Prince is not ready, wouldn't the Queen actually be ruler?

That this scene evokes all this makes me forgive its savage cutting of the Player's speech, and indeed, Hamlet's own. We go from the Players' arrival directly to "Will you see them well-bestowed?" This massive cut, and Polonius' late entry means Hamlet need not be angry at the the councilor's comments. His retort ("who shall 'scape whipping?") is said with wit and a pleasant measure of sarcasm, but not anger. Polonius has not deserved any - he hasn't interrupted or criticized the Player's speech. Hamlet then announces they will hear a play tomorrow night, though the exchange between him and the Player is not shown. We might infer - knowing the play as we do - that Hamlet and the Player devised the "Mouse-Trap" on the way to the castle, but that will not be apparent to the uninitiated. It seems strange to us that Zeffirelli would try to hide 400-year-old plot points, but he is evidently crafting an accessible Hamlet for large movie audiences who might not know the story, playing out its twists and turns as surprises.
It is only after all this that he confides in Rosencrantz & Guildenstern that he is ony partly mad, moving the line from the end of the previous sequence to the end of this one. In its new position, and with the King and Queen now part of the sequence, the line acts as a loyalty test. Hamlet makes like he's leaving, but pops his head back out to watch R&G run to the King and tell him everything that's just gone between them and Hamlet. This confirms their treachery, and acts as a precursor to Hamlet's confirmation that Claudius is likewise a villain. So again, though Zeffirelli plays fast and loose with the text, he replaces it with visuals that, in their own visual way, informs. His version benefits from this closer reading.

II.ii. The Players - BBC '80

The BBC version provides us with a very different take on the First Player's speech, but before we get there, Polonius must announce the players' arrival. As he attempts to do so, Jacobi's Hamlet continues to mess with him. He puts on voices, reads along with the scroll in a show of boredom, throws himself to the ground in worship, imagining Polonius to be the revered figure of Jephtah, and waves his hand in the air with the meter of his quoted lines. This whirlwind of activity confounds Polonius, of course, but sets the tone for the players' arrival. Hamlet is a showman, like they are, and the sequence draws strong parallels between the prince and the people who may play at being princes.
As they enter, juggling torches and tumbling, Hamlet indulges in a bit of stage fighting using wooden swords, prefiguring the play's finale in which he also fights a friend. Hamlet is being bearded by the First Player, a man older than he is, played by Welsh actor Emrys James (the vampire Aukon to Doctor Who fans that same year). The "bearded" line usually indicates the actor being spoken to is younger or as old as Hamlet himself, someone who has grown a beard (i.e. gotten older, from boy to man) since Hamlet last saw him. Subverting the line at once confuses Hamlet's age further and makes us think of the line in more metaphorical terms. I become less interested in the fact the First Player is newly bearded, but more in Hamlet's assertion that the Player would "top" him in some way. He doesn't "beard" him by being more hirsute, but rather by being more emotionally available, and by doing more to reveal the King's treachery with a single scene than Hamlet has managed to do since the start of the play.

Hamlet next addresses the "lady" of the group, and in line with the production's Medievalism, "she" is played by a boy, a boy who proves his voice has not cracked by singing a clear "La". These fun bits are followed by Hamlet's attempt at a speech, which showcases the strong chemistry between him and the First Player. The Player goes beyond his lines by harrumphing here, nodding there, guiding Hamlet through the start of the monologue. He is Hamlet's guide, a telling fact. Jacobi makes less of a meal of it than Branagh does, but at the end of the speech still gets applause. He graciously accepts it, though he mockingly curtsies Polonius when the councilor offers appreciation. When Polonius later interrupts, he does so less brazenly than Briars does in the 1996 version, leaning in on the word "ear" and confiding his comment discreetly, but he draws no less anger from the explosive Hamlet.
As long as we're making comparisons, Heston's Player definitely has more gravitas, while James' emotions are more overt and desperate, bigger and thus more theatrical (as opposed to cinematic). The speech ends with the Player's hands on his face, but when Hamlet takes them off, he is all smiles. And yet, he sniffles through the rest of the scene. The faked "trappings" of grief still required a certain measure of truth. Where James shines as the Player, however, is in how he milks the awkwardness of Hamlet's outbursts against Polonius - slightly amused, but still respectful. He takes sides in the most subtle way possible, an example Polonius might have been smart to follow, but his love for his own wit prevents him from ever being like the Player. Polonius doesn't know his lines or his place, and he will suffer for it.

As the party disbands, Hamlet pulls a wooden sword on Rosencrantz & Guildenstern, providing them with one last scare. They hand him his book back, but he leaves them hanging, never taking it back. The staging here drips with sarcasm, as their "welcome to Elsinore" is anything but heartfelt.

II.ii. The Players - Olivier '48

In Olivier's version, the players only appear after Hamlet has his arranged encounter with Ophelia and "To be or not to be". Though a different moment altogether, it is still a dark one for Hamlet who, in the normal sequence, is meditating on melancholy. Olivier's flights of expressionism thus cast Hamlet in a dark space. Symbolically, Polonius walks in with a torch that illuminates the Prince. And when the players come in (with many torches), the room, which might as well have been the dark of night, fills with light. Polonius' arrival and subsequent announcement of the players gives Hamlet the glimmer of an idea, and that arrival a new sense of purpose, all of it expressed with lighting as much as acting. Polonius reads from a parchment - Felix Aylmer is as amusing as usual - and doesn't know what to make of "He that plays the king shall be welcome."

In the absence of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern, there is a certain irony to Polonius being the bearer of news that will undo him and his corrupt king.
From the Players' entrance, Hamlet enters a manic state, delivering lines at a furious pace, often preventing anyone from interjecting. This will be a much shorter scene, heavily cut and missing the Priam speech. "I am glad to see thee well" is spoken to a dog walking on its hind legs, eliciting some laughs. The "lady" is an historically accurate boy. The bearded player is First Player, which makes the character younger that he appears (a mirror of Hamlet's own, doubtful age?). Of course it could just mean he grew a beard, but the text does mean to refer to an actor getting older. Harcourt Williams who plays the First Player was already in his late 60s however. Olivier plays on expectations when choosing his lines' targets to amusing effect, but doesn't really squeeze extra meaning from the text.

Since there is no recital, Hamlet quickly asks them to follow Polonius, and as they go, so does the light. However, Hamlet is now facing front, a reversal of his initial position. He is ready to take a step forward (the play within a play), moving away from the introspection and back-and-forth that has been the crux of the play since his silent visit of Ophelia. In his reconfigured sequence, Olivier loads Hamlet's inaction in the front end of the play, rather than allow ambivalence between thinking up and enacting his guilt-revealing scheme.

II.ii. The Players - Branagh '96

Branagh finds a number of ways to make sure his audience doesn't grow bored during this sequence. There's a long, single taker (or "oner") that follows Hamlet for what is probably an entire roll of film. Because modern audiences are not likely to know the Iliad of Aeneid, the Player's speech is illustrated with silent scenes. And as with many of the smaller roles, he makes use of stunt casting. We'll get to all that in a moment, but let's start at the top of the sequence as Polonius arrives to announce the players' arrival.
This announcement is, of course, redundant, because Rosencrantz & Guildenstern have already done so. Polonius can never be anything but tedious, relating information Hamlet already has. This is also underscored by Polonius reading from the troupe's artistic statement, going through ever redundant genres. Hamlet tries to walk away, and takes an actorly voice to mock him when he can't escape. He recites from the biblical story of Jephtah, he puts on voices, he acts out his madness for Polonius. At the same time, he's letting R&G in on the joke, making them complicit in his disrespect of a lord that while below Hamlet's position, is well above theirs. He certainly has reason to believe Polonius will tattle to the King and Queen, so he sows mistrust between the conspirators. Throughout this scene, R&G look like they don't quite know what's happening, or if this will wind up costing them their heads. When they next interact with Claudius, we'll see characters desperate to make their case and a king who doesn't care to listen. They probably think they've been compromised by their "friendship" with Hamlet. It is doubtful Claudius even registers their presence by that point. As for Polonius, he is visibly irritated by Hamlet's performance, and distracted by it. He fails to recognize what lies under the Jephtah allusion, though this might also be a way to further elevate the puritan Hamlet from the corrupt court. Polonius doesn't know his Bible.

The players then come in, and to respect the time period, the girl who should watch her voice lest it crack is played by a little girl, not a boy. Hamlet is teasing her, and we do get the sense that the entire family is on tour. It immediately makes us compare this family with Hamlet's, and indeed the Player will be King on stage, the lady Queen and another actor the assassin. They seem happier of course and only "play" at tragedy. The point of the sequence is to show actors having more sincere feelings than real people do, so there's that mirror there as well. Later, Hamlet will ask his mother where her blush is. Claudius will pray and not mean it. Hamlet swears revenge, but can't follow through. Here, we have an actor who shows great passion in a speech about fictional characters. If Shakespeare teaches us anything, it is to feel. His characters do and through the poetry, they describe those feelings and make them real. And so in the play, it is the actors who similarly teach Hamlet how to feel.

Hamlet himself is an actor - he plays the role of the madman - and this becomes more literal in this sequence as he starts reciting the speech he asks from the First Player. If the speech was never acted, or only once, as Hamlet claims, he certainly has a strong memory of it. We're reminded that we're in the presence of a great mind. Branagh has fun with it though, with even the kids knowing some of the punchlines (like "gules"). He is finally taken out of his performance by the sight of his own hand holding an imaginary dagger, an invisible reminder of the task ahead.

The First Player is played by Charlton Heston, a choice Branagh says he made to properly show that the Player is a legend of the theater. And indeed, Heston has that (screen) presence. And it's probably his best performance ever. It blew me away and is one of my favorite things about the film. If his casting evokes a legend of the acting world, his speech is also about legendary characters, and these are played by true legends of the stage in the live action "illustrations". Priam is played by John Gielgud:
And Hecuba by Judi Dench:
Could it get any better? Their small roles are still a challenge, as they must show a great deal of emotion in a completely silent performance. Though they are not strictly seen by the other characters in the play, they make the same point the Player does: Actors showing a great depth of emotion (again in an idealized King/Queen configuration).

The Player's speech is interrupted by Polonius, and comically, the music also stops and starts with in between his interventions. Tension mounts between Hamlet and the old counselor until he gets his wrists slapped at the end. It's what he gets for showing evident dislike and disrespect to the players. As the party breaks up, Hamlet sends R&G away, and for some reason, Horatio is now included (having come in with the players). He has no lines, but Hamlet gives him a secret signal to go with them and keep a close eye on them. Perhaps it was felt Horatio had not appeared in too long. Other directors have placed him as a silent witness to all of R&G's scenes, so his presence isn't unwanted.

II.ii. The Players

Though Polonius announcing the Players, their arrival and Hamlet's request to the First Player are usually retained, it is rarer for the First Player to get to do his long speech. This is understandable, since the play is already very long, and the sequence is very much a digression. That said, it exists for a reason, not only as a trigger for Hamlet's next soliloquy, but as a mirror or lesson related to Hamlet's situation. By discussing the text here, and in the next posts, looking at what was kept of it, it is my hope that light will be shed on certain aspects of the play. As usual, Shakespeare's words are in italics.

Enter POLONIUS

LORD POLONIUS: Well be with you, gentlemen!
HAMLET: Hark you, Guildenstern; and you too: at each ear a hearer: that great baby you see there is not yet out of his swaddling-clouts.
ROSENCRANTZ: Happily he's the second time come to them; for they say an old man is twice a child.

This banter harks back to and inverts Hamlet's slanders and the idea that the old man would grow younger if, like a crab, he could go backwards. Whether old or young, Polonius is ineffectual. Also in play is the concept of the life cycle from youth to old age and back to youth again, any interruption of which is shown to be unnatural. Consider the murder of Hamlet's father (or indeed, of many of the characters) and Ophelia's madness (in which she returns to childhood before even becoming an adult). Life cycles are often discussed in play, whether it's the king making its way through the guts of a beggar via a worm, or great Alexander returning to the earth. Denmark too is undergoing a cycle from King to King to Fortinbras, albeit a diverted (unnatural) one that replaced Hamlet Jr. with Claudius.

HAMLET: I will prophesy he comes to tell me of the players; mark it. You say right, sir: o' Monday morning; 'twas so indeed.
LORD POLONIUS: My lord, I have news to tell you.
HAMLET: My lord, I have news to tell you.
When Roscius was an actor in Rome,--
LORD POLONIUS: The actors are come hither, my lord.
HAMLET: Buz, buz!
LORD POLONIUS: Upon mine honour,--
HAMLET: Then came each actor on his ass,--
LORD POLONIUS: The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable, or poem unlimited: Seneca cannot be too heavy, nor Plautus too light. For the law of writ and the liberty, these are the only men.

A choice should be made by the director and actor here as to whether Polonius is reading from the Players' promotional materials or if it's his own opinion. Either way, he shows his tediousness by listing all those genres and genre combos.

HAMLET: O Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst thou!
LORD POLONIUS: What a treasure had he, my lord?
HAMLET: Why,
'One fair daughter and no more,
The which he loved passing well.'
LORD POLONIUS: [Aside] Still on my daughter.
HAMLET: Am I not i' the right, old Jephthah?
LORD POLONIUS: If you call me Jephthah, my lord, I have a daughter that I love passing well.
HAMLET: Nay, that follows not.
LORD POLONIUS: What follows, then, my lord?
HAMLET: Why, 'As by lot, God wot,' and then, you know, 'It came to pass, as most like it was,'-- the first row of the pious chanson will show you more; for look, where my abridgement comes.

Jephthah is a Biblical character (in the book of Judges) who rashly vowed to sacrifice the first person to come to his door if God allows him to advance his lot in life (becoming chieftain) if he defeats the Ammonites. He does so, but it's his daughter who comes to the door. Unlike Abraham, his hand is not stayed and his daughter is burnt as an offering. Polonius doesn't get the reference, but Hamlet surely does. There is an indication here that Polonius is using Ophelia as a pawn in order to advance (or retain) his position in the eyes of the King. He either knows he's been set up to meet Ophelia later, or refers to Polonius forbidding Ophelia to see the prince (what would the King and Queen THINK?). In any case, Shakespeare makes this little speech a prophetic one, as Ophelia is indeed sacrificed in the course of the play.

Enter four or five Players

You are welcome, masters; welcome, all. I am glad to see thee well. Welcome, good friends. O, my old friend! thy face is valenced since I saw thee last: comest thou to beard me in Denmark? What, my young lady and mistress! By'r lady, your ladyship is nearer to heaven than when I saw you last, by the altitude of a chopine. Pray God, your voice, like a piece of uncurrent gold, be not cracked within the ring. Masters, you are all welcome. We'll e'en to't like French falconers, fly at any thing we see: we'll have a speech straight: come, give us a taste of your quality; come, a passionate speech.

References to the lady's voice cracking point to the Elizabethan rule that no women could be on the stage. Women were thus often played by teenage boys before puberty made their voices change. Hamlet asking for a speech right away is somewhat ironic given his own delayed actions.

FIRST PLAYER: What speech, my lord?
HAMLET
I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was never acted; or, if it was, not above once;

It's almost like Shakespeare is talking to modern directors, knowing this part of the play will, more often than not, be cut for time.

for the play, I remember, pleased not the million; 'twas caviare to the general: but it was--as I received it, and others, whose judgments in such matters cried in the top of mine--an excellent play, well digested in the scenes, set down with as much modesty as cunning. I remember, one said there were no sallets in the lines to make the matter savoury, nor no matter in the phrase that might indict the author of affectation; but called it an honest method, as wholesome as sweet, and by very much more handsome than fine. One speech in it I chiefly loved: 'twas Aeneas' tale to Dido; and thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of Priam's slaughter: if it live in your memory, begin at this line: let me see, let me see--
'The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast,'--
it is not so:--it begins with Pyrrhus:--
'The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms,
Black as his purpose, did the night resemble
When he lay couched in the ominous horse,
Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd
With heraldry more dismal; head to foot
Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd
With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons,
Baked and impasted with the parching streets,
That lend a tyrannous and damned light
To their lord's murder: roasted in wrath and fire,
And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore,
With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus
Old grandsire Priam seeks.'
So, proceed you.

It seems Hamlet's "thoughts be bloody" long before he utters that particular phrase. In this tale from Virgil's Aeneid, he finds allusion to his own situation, i.e. the murder of his lord, though the citizenry is far more outraged at the turn of events than Denmark's. As we'll see, this is not the last idealization of the situation contained in the speech.

LORD POLONIUS: 'Fore God, my lord, well spoken, with good accent and good discretion.
FIRST PLAYER: 'Anon he finds him
Striking too short at Greeks; his antique sword,
Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls,
Repugnant to command: unequal match'd,
Pyrrhus at Priam drives; in rage strikes wide;
But with the whiff and wind of his fell sword
The unnerved father falls. Then senseless Ilium,
Seeming to feel this blow, with flaming top
Stoops to his base, and with a hideous crash
Takes prisoner Pyrrhus' ear: for, lo! his sword,
Which was declining on the milky head
Of reverend Priam, seem'd i' the air to stick:
So, as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood,
And like a neutral to his will and matter,
Did nothing.

The question here is whether Hamlet is "with" Priam the victim-king, or with Pyrrhus the avenger. Like Pyrrhus, Hamlet is stuck in a moment in time, unable to act, though for him, being "painted" takes almost the whole of the play. If Pyrrhus is Claudius however, it becomes completely appropriate to give the usurper ("painted tyrant" has a double-meaning of falsehood) a moment of doubt when reenacting the murder (if such a thing is shown in flashback). Despite this hesitation, Pyrrhus then savagely strikes down Priam, again a mix of Hamlet's own idealized revenge and Claudius' unnaturally violent fratricide. Therein may lie Hamlet's dilemma: Can he do what he accuses Claudius of having done (a violent regicide).

But, as we often see, against some storm,
A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,
The bold winds speechless and the orb below
As hush as death, anon the dreadful thunder
Doth rend the region, so, after Pyrrhus' pause,
Aroused vengeance sets him new a-work;
And never did the Cyclops' hammers fall
On Mars's armour forged for proof eterne
With less remorse than Pyrrhus' bleeding sword
Now falls on Priam.
Out, out, thou strumpet, Fortune! All you gods,

This is the second mention of Fortune specifically as a strumpet, which should be a clue to the audience that Hamlet's situation is linked to this speech. Though the content is largely about murder (note Priam's defenselessness), there is the idea of a tragic destiny as well ringing through both plays (Hamlet itself and this "rarely performed" Aeneic play).

In general synod 'take away her power;
Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel,
And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven,
As low as to the fiends!'
LORD POLONIUS: This is too long.
HAMLET: It shall to the barber's, with your beard. Prithee, say on: he's for a jig or a tale of bawdry, or he sleeps: say on: come to Hecuba.

Shakespeare seems to know his problem play's problems and seeks to detract critics by acknowledging them in the text. Polonius says here what many in the audience must have thought. What is this digression and why is it taking so long. This pause gives comic relief to the sequence, and manages to poke fun at the author while at the same time brooking no criticism. Hamlet's reply puts Polonius, and those audience members, in their place.

FIRST PLAYER: 'But who, O, who had seen the mobled queen--'
HAMLET: 'The mobled queen?'
LORD POLONIUS: That's good; 'mobled queen' is good.
FIRST PLAYER: 'Run barefoot up and down, threatening the flames
With bisson rheum; a clout upon that head
Where late the diadem stood, and for a robe,
About her lank and all o'er-teemed loins,
A blanket, in the alarm of fear caught up;
Who this had seen, with tongue in venom steep'd,
'Gainst Fortune's state would treason have pronounced:
But if the gods themselves did see her then
When she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sport
In mincing with his sword her husband's limbs,
The instant burst of clamour that she made,
Unless things mortal move them not at all,
Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven,
And passion in the gods.'

Hamlet's link to Hecuba is, as with the rest, two-fold. On the one hand, he sees himself in her, the grieving family member whose passion would defy the fates. On the other, she is an idealized version of his own mother, what his mother SHOULD have been like upon his father's death.

LORD POLONIUS: Look, whether he has not turned his colour and has tears in's eyes. Pray you, no more.
HAMLET: 'Tis well: I'll have thee speak out the rest soon. Good my lord, will you see the players well bestowed? Do you hear, let them be well used; for they are the abstract and brief chronicles of the time: after your death you were better have a bad epitaph than their ill report while you live.
LORD POLONIUS: My lord, I will use them according to their desert.
HAMLET: God's bodykins, man, much better: use every man after his desert, and who should 'scape whipping? Use them after your own honour and dignity: the less they deserve, the more merit is in your bounty. Take them in.

Hamlet's heartfelt rebuke is in stark opposition to his mission, and may hold a clue as to the reason for his delayed revenge. Though Claudius, Gertrude and other conspirators deserve very little, he has vowed to, so to speak, whip them. This line may belie his true nature, which is rather more gentle than it needs to be to carry out the Ghost's vengeance. Hamlet is damned either way.

LORD POLONIUS: Come, sirs.
HAMLET: Follow him, friends: we'll hear a play to-morrow.

Exit POLONIUS with all the Players but the First

Dost thou hear me, old friend; can you play the Murder of Gonzago?
FIRST PLAYER: Ay, my lord.
HAMLET: We'll ha't to-morrow night. You could, for a need, study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, which I would set down and insert in't, could you not?
FIRST PLAYER: Ay, my lord.
HAMLET: Very well. Follow that lord; and look you mock him not.

Exit First Player

My good friends, I'll leave you till night: you are welcome to Elsinore.

ROSENCRANTZ: Good my lord!
HAMLET: Ay, so, God be wi' ye;

Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN

While this sequence is often cut short, some elements need to remain in order to trigger the "What a rogue and peasant slave" speech that follows it. In the next series of articles, we'll see how various directors handled this difficult passage that threatens to make the audience impatient.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - French Rock Opera

R&G's failed interrogation of Hamlet is best represented by the song Quel mal te bouffe? (What's Eating You?), a short ditty (excerpt via Amazon) sung by the choir (Hallyday only sings Hamlet's parts) which is inappropriately (or for R&G, quite appropriately) ridiculous-sounding. The French lyrics, followed by my quick and dirty translation:

Quel mal te bouffe?
Quel mal te bouffe?
Quel mal te ronge?
Quel mal te ronge?
Quel mal te bouffe?

Quel mal te bouffe?
Quel mal te ronge?
Dis-nous, dis-nous, dis-nous, dis-nous...
Des anges! Des anges! Des anges! Des anges!

(Répétez tout)

What's Eating You?
What's eating you?
What's gnawing at you?
What's gnawing at you?
What's eating you?

What's eating you?
What's gnawing at you?
Tell us, tell us, tell us, tell us...
Angels! Angels! Angels! Angels!

(Repeat all)

The familiar vocabulary used is in line with R&G's usual depiction as people who do not connect with Hamlet's deep emotions. "What's eating you?" reduces Hamlet's mal d'âme to a mild irritant. Hallyday glosses over the "What a piece of work is a man" speech in the last line when Hamlet reveals (ambiguously, because it's still not his voice) he is "bugged" by angels. A bizarre response in the context of the song, but those who know the play can see a connection between this answer and the line "How like an angel". As sung by R&G, it's almost like they're claiming some kind of innocence in all this, again tying into the irony of Hamlet's speech.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Classics Illustrated

The original
The original Classics Illustrated omits this entire sequence, though R&G ARE characters in the comic. They are introduced at the Scene's proper start and are not seen again until after the play within a play. This allows the comic to avoid the ribald pleasantries as well as the theatrical gossip which were no doubt considered either inappropriate or irrelevant to the target audience.

The Berkley version
While the sequence does appear in artist Tom Mandrake's vision, it is cut for brevity. The effect is akin to jump cuts, moving the exchange along almost too quickly. The foppish R&G are discovered almost right away, Hamlet moving from dropping his book in joy to accusations in the space of a single panel. He then heads into his speech, still without R&G reacting. Note the visual link to "I have an eye of you" in the following panel.Though not shown at that point, it underscores the point of the page/sequence: Hamlet's piercing gaze uncovering the duo's duplicity. R&G don't even get to snicker at "man delights not me" in this version, Hamlet volunteering "nor woman neither" without being prompted. The action is rather strangely staged:
What is Hamlet doing? With the interaction gone, he seems to have a violent fit motivated by self-loathing, but perhaps also hatred for his parents (man and woman). The line is turned into an attack of the unfaithful couple, into hatred that we know is at least partly transferred to his other relationships (Ophelia, R&G).

Hamlet once again changes his mood when he hears of the Players (a change that seems more extreme by virtue of the above panel's intensity) and though the gossip is cut, the admission of partial madness is retained. R&G's lines suffer so many cuts that Hamlet is almost in soliloquy mode through most of the sequence, and since he has an audience, the soliloquy might better be called a rant.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Tennant (2009)

Though some R&G pairings emphasize the betrayal, acting as somewhat sinister agents of the Royals, the 2009 R&G emphasize just how much they've grown apart from Hamlet. While he is an adult struggling with adult things, they are immature boys giggling at all the wrong bits and staring at their feet when things get serious. It's an extremely funny performance, even as the tension and discomfort mount. R&G are helped immensely by the editing, giving them reaction shots for many of Hamlet's lines. Instead of having the prince rattle on an uninterrupted speech, there's the sense that R&D do indeed have lines, albeit silent ones. Pauses, stares, the putting of hands in pockets, hard swallows... this is where they live - in between the lines (funny, then, that it's where Hamlet "reads" them).

And the discomfort is felt by Hamlet too. He's happy to see them, but before he can ever feel their betrayal, he visibly feels that they are no longer on the same page. Guildenstern's giggling during the Fortune banter makes Hamlet uncomfortably stammer through the next line, desperate to change the subject. He's humoring them, but doesn't share in their mirth. (It's also one of the few "Doctorish" bits in the film. Tennant reigns in a lot of his Doctor Who mannerisms in this performance, but they sometimes slip by. It happens again at the end of the sequence when he starts acting crazy again, adopting a cockney accent and making clicking noises when he delivers the "hawk from a handsaw" line, which you can easily compare to the "you've had some cowboys up in here" stuff of his Doctor.)
R&G are naturally dumbfounded at the "depression" speech, once again, reverses allowing the characters to be active witnesses. Tennant delivers the speech with obvious sarcasm. His voice breaking at the end makes R&G's giggles more inappropriate than ever. Rosencrantz actually lets out a little "a-ha!" there, indicating that he thinks he's understood a meaning (finally), perhaps that this was all a long joke about liking women, but he's of course wrong.

One problem with the problem play is figuring out when Hamlet concocted his plan to stage a play that would catch the King's conscience. The speech in which he reveals it comes at the end of the Act, but there are various point before then where Hamlet seems to be acting in accordance to this plan already. Tennant hits on this idea quite early. His expression when he hears about the Players makes it clear he's already thinking about it, motivating the line "He that plays the king shall be welcome". We'll see later if and how Tennant picks up the threads of this idea later. At that moment, it gives him a boost of mad energy and he starts acting the loon again. He strangely picks through Guildenstern's pockets, crosses his arms before shaking R&G's hands and takes on accents.

Trims and Cuts
There are few trims to the text in this section. The entire rhetoric of shadows' shadows, for example, is not delivered. Hamlet also doesn't reveal that he is "most dreadfully attended". None of these have any great effect on the play. The only outright cut is the usual decision to remove the theatrical gossip. Again, this is not a huge loss, though in this case it does make "It is not very strange; for mine uncle is king of Denmark..." something of a non-sequitur, albeit one of many R&G have to react to.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Fodor (2007)

A weak Hamlet
Fodor's Hamlet - not to say William Bedchambers' - is weaker than in any other version of the play, and this sequence shows how the director has undermined the character in a number of ways. First, of course, is in how R&G - the play's notoriously weak characters - interact with him. Instead of fearful sycophants, we instead have short-tempered, bored louts. Hamlet is suspicious of them and antagonistic (he just caught them talking to the conspirators), but gets no real reaction from them except even more disdain and ire. When accused, they meet outrage with outrage and shame Hamlet for being "poor in thanks". The overall effect is that R&G are stronger characters than Hamlet. They win this skirmish.
There's also the matter of Horatio, who is at Hamlet's side throughout this sequence. She not only has her emotions under more control than Hamlet, sizing up R&G with, by turns, a steady gaze and the same kind of dismissive boredom, but she also borrows some of Hamlet's lines ("Then is doomsday near" and later, the question as to why the Players are on the road). Hamlet is not a whole man in Fodor's vision, he needs to be completed by Horatio. Where R&G are usual the "two who are one" and still don't measure up to one Hamlet, here Hamlet must meet two with two, and still loses the argument.

Whether you agree with this idea or not, there are interesting things about the way Fodor stages the sequence. Until an accusation is actually made, each duo is never in the same shot as the other. They are separate and, in R&G's case, refuse to engage. Both groups look into camera, involving the audience in an unsettling way (very much what Fodor is going for throughout the film, which also justifies his emasculation of the lead) and playing with the mirror effects inherent in the text. Reference to Denmark being a prison shifts our point of view to the Ghost, listening and turning his head. An intriguing piece of editing, as it links the idea with that of Hamlet's father being trapped in a hellish state. Denmark is a prison to Hamlet, but it represents much worse to the Ghost. Hamlet is also haunted by his child-self, another ghostly character lurking about, though much happier, laughing behind potted plants - a counterpoint to the prince's depressing vision of Denmark.

The cut from confession directly into "What a piece of work is a man", omitting further description of Denmark's putrid skies, turns the line's irony to straight sarcasm and becomes the accusation that finally rouses R&G from their torpor. As often happens with cuts, it reveals an intent that is more ambiguous when lines are distanced from one another. It may thus be true to say that Hamlet always meant this speech to refer to R&D, two friends who have deeply disappointed him. Not that Fodor in any way paints them as friends.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Hamlet 2000

R&G board Hamlet in a club chronologically after the "To be or not to be" speech. They are played by Steve Zahn (as Rosencrantz) and Dechen Thurman (brother of Uma, as Guildenstern). Hamlet embraces these two wild and crazy friends, initiating a long booze-up. Their idiosyncratic performances soon reveal them to be two different kinds of creep. Rosencrantz is manic, spinning on stools, making karate moves and shouting through the music in a way that Hamlet simply does not. Meanwhile, Guildenstern is on the other end of the scale, listlessly resting his head on Hamlet's shoulder, his sexuality as relaxed as the rest of him. They come off as immature party lads, unable to grasp Hamlet's true nature.

The film retains the banter, spreading it across the night through time cuts, but cuts everything after it. Hamlet does not force these men to confess their allegiance to his parents. There is no "what a piece of work is a man" speech at this point, nor is there discussion of the Players. Indeed, the film does away with the Players and replaces them with actors on film. They are not characters in their own right. From this scene, we immediately move to R&D reporting to the Royals (by phone), a result of this sequence, brought forward editorially for comic effect. That sequence makes it clear he says some of the things he does in the play, if only off-screen. The other effect is to keep 2000's Hamlet a more internal character who might know R&G are spies, but does not tell them he knows.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Kline '90

In Kline's version, we likewise only meet R&G at this point. They are played by Philip Goodwin (a nerdy Rosencrantz) and Reg. E. Cathey (a cool Guildenstern). Though the latter's casting gives the part some pizazz (Cathey could never be anything but cool), and despite the obvious differences in the two characters, we find they are still twinned. I had not noticed before how often they use the pronoun "we", even when stating opinion. "We think not so," says one, instinctively knowing what the other thinks as well. It's an example of how the text innocuously supports the ideas of the play. Another is Hamlet's "To speak like an honest man," which prods us into questioning his words. Is he not honest the rest of the time? Even in that moment, he speaks LIKE an honest man, not AS an honest man. Should we trust him even here?

Sincere or not, Hamlet seems genuinely happy to see his friends here, at least, until he senses their betrayal. Kline is especially strong in this section, internalizing that betrayal before going into a manic state (for their benefit?). He clasps them to his breast in an awkward position, violence and love mixed. He lets out his anger at them in the guise of madcap love, in a sense ACTING like an honest, sincere man, but not AS an one. We might remember, at this point, how Hamlet questioned whether wearing the trappings of grief was in any way equivalent to feeling grief profoundly and truly. The same could be said of the trappings of friendship and love, and the play continually toys with the theme of "representation" both on stage in in our lives.
There's a nice bit of staging for the "What a piece of work is a man" speech, as Hamlet forces R&G to join him on the floor to look at the ceiling/sky. They are upside down, and indeed the speech itself is an inversion of the natural order.

At the end of the sequence, the Players are announced, but the gossip (as usual) excised. As Hamlet confesses his partial madness, he pickpockets his book back from Rosencrantz's jacket pocket, even though the viewer probably didn't notice him putting it there. It's an interesting symbol for Hamlet picking their brains, or even of having put words/thoughts in their mouths/minds (the reversed confession). Again we have acts of violence (theft is a form of outrage) cast as love and friendship. Teasing, but meaning to do more than tease.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Zeffirelli '90

Zefirelli, in addition to many cuts, disrupts the usual order of the play at this point. From the fishmonger scene, he moves to Hamlet's arranged meeting with Ophelia, then to "To be or not to be", before finally moving us outside Elsinore for our first encounter with Rosencrantz & Guildenstern. Hamlet takes a horse ride and lays down on a carpet of greenery, all very idyllic, perhaps as an ironic counterpoint to his contention that Denmark is a pestilent prison. The director is keen to keep things as visual as possible, making many cuts in the dialog, which I personally find annoying because the visuals definitely don't replace the nuances of the text, nor do they always bring anything to the film except a change of pace for the audience's eyes. For example, this sequence will move from this secluded spot to an open cabin facing the beach where the friends can have lunch. This does not perceptibly illuminate the nature of their relationship, and the way it is staged, even confuses it.
R&G are played by Michael Maloney (Laertes under Branagh, and Hamlet in Midwinter's Dream) and Sean Murray, respectively. They come upon Hamlet where he reclines, almost Christ-like, and in a change from the play, they are escorted by Horatio and (young) Marcellus. So what does this suggest? Have they been to Elsinore, had their meeting with the Royals, and have gone to look for Hamlet? Or does Horatio have a privileged relationship with R&G? The former seems more probable. Without any lines, Horatio is basically there to look at Hamlet with sadness as his friend either bares his soul or lies to common friends (again, ambiguous), or to receive pregnant looks from Hamlet (as in the "What a piece of work is a man" speech; where the prince either acknowledges his friend's compassion or means to pass on the message that he is putting on a show for R&G).

Hamlet's entire attitude towards R&G gets away from the usual idea of describing melancholy or depression. He is quickly angry at them for withholding their true intentions, something they admit to only after a show of violence when he kicks a stool from under Rosencrantz. His delivery of key speeches is rather more venal than other Hamlets', as if to say "I'm not happy and there's nothing you can do about it, gents". He doesn't put on any particular show of madness (and the line about being mad north-north-west is cut in any case), but states his point-of-view matter-of-factly. And since most of the speech is spoken to Horatio, back to the others, it can't even be said that he shows a moment of vulnerability to R&G. This follows an introduction in which Hamlet hardly seems to remember their names.

As I said, there are many cuts made to this sequence. Most of the playful banter between the friends is gone. Hamlet no longer welcomes them to Elsinore. He doesn't let slip any remark about his uncle. And of course, the theatrical gossip has been excised. Now the grubby players show up in a large wagon, and Rosencrantz points at them. Zeffirelli then gets back to his visuals, with a long sequence showing the troupe enter Elsinore.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - BBC '80

As is sometimes done to Horatio in Act I, Hamlet gives his greetings to R&G before he even recognizes them. When he does, Rosencrantz, the jokester of the two, lets out a little "pa-dum" that puts us in the frame of mind of a "beaten friendship". Hamlet immediately subverts that however by mistaking Rosencrantz for Guildenstern, spinning both names at the same character to fix his mistake and getting an annoyed smirk from him. The friendship presented here has apparently been misgauged by the Queen. Hamlet is dismissive and distrustful of his so-called friends, and often plays the scene as an attack. He is in complete control and foils them at every turn. He tries to get sympathy from them, but doesn't get it, such attempts feeling like tests R&G fail to pass.

Jacobi's Hamlet is mercurial as ever, moving through various emotions in order to give each line its own portent. There is a belly laugh at the Fortune joke, immediately followed by a quiet moment when he calls her a strumpet, allowing the viewer time to see a connection to Hamlet's mother. He is wholly sarcastic when he says he's "poor in thanks", giving no quarter to his false friends. "Nay speak", when he draws a confession out of them, is explicitly to prevent them from colluding. No asides for you, R&G! And the emphasis placed on "thinking makes it so" takes a more literal turn when he says there's a confession in their looks. There really isn't... UNTIL he says there is, and then they break down. He has imposed his will on them. His thought has become reality.

The emphasis on that line also makes it important for the whole of the play, which is, indeed, about a man trying to convince himself to exact revenge. Hamlet must first think of himself as an avenger/murderer before it can become a reality. That movement from thought to deed is what creates tension in the play. We'll note later how Hamlet accuses himself of violent thoughts, thoughts that only later are transposed into deeds. Hamlet is a true Shakespearean character: He overhears himself (as Bloom would put it) and is transformed by his own words. Thinking things make them so.

But back to the scene... Hamlet then goes on to anticipate their questions in the way Jacobi delivers "But wherefore I know not". He doesn't just know they were sent for, he knows WHY they were.
The "what a piece of work is a man" is read in his book (which is only a book of slanders if you believe Hamet was making up the earlier words to suit Polonius), a departure from most stagings. Here, they are not his words. He could never think of Man in those terms. While it robs Hamlet of a poetic élan, it makes sense in the framework of his depression. The decaying view of the world is all his, spoken in reaction to what he's just read. "Man delights not me", right at the end, has his holding back tears in earnest. Which of course is exactly where Rosencrantz gets the giggles, all part of R&G's inability to gauge Hamlet or a situation. It's a well done moment, and sends us careening into the theatrical gossip segment and back into R&G's comfort zone. The sequence ends with them believing they are welcome in Elsinore despite Hamlet's earlier attacks.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Olivier '48

Since Olivier has completely excised R&G, this sequence has gone with them. We lose many key lines and one of the best known speeches, and that certainly has an effect on the play. One might argue that Olivier plays clinical depression (i.e. melancholy) well enough that we hardly need the speech describing his mood, and indeed, Olivier's adaptation is more dour for losing the witty banter between Hamlet and his school chums. We are left with a single line, spoken to Polonius when he comes to announce the players: "He that plays the king shall be welcome." Olivier obviously thought it important, and it is. It ironically sends up Claudius by replacing him with a more welcome pretender.

But however little the effect on the particulars of the plot, one still misses the wit and poetry of Shakespeare's words.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Branagh '96

In Branagh's production, R&G arrive on a small steam train, evoking their childhood friendship with Hamlet. Almost immediately, they fall into the sort of clever banter they used to indulge in with the witty prince. The setting also seems important. Meeting them outside Elsinore reminds us that they are outsiders to the Court they desperately want to be a part of, but exteriors also give weight to Hamlet's line about being a king of infinite space, and in his black figure against the snow connects Hamlet to the shadowy dream (his unrealized revenge) and the outstretched echo of a hero or monarch who is but a beggar (as he refers to himself soon after). Another reason to place this scene outside is to reveal R&G's duplicity. We have already seen them inside Elsinore, so their surprise "arrival" is a con. When Hamlet tells them their news is not true, it seems at first that he means "the world's grown honest", but it may just as well refer to their entire arrival.

Branagh plays Hamlet as emotional here. As soon as he calls R&G on their untrue news, his eyes start to water, perhaps in anger. He realizes early on that he has been betrayed by childhood friends. This emotion pours out when he confronts them about it. And he does so head on. "I have an eye of you", scripted as an aside, is here a warning. Hamlet in fact uses his emotion to shame them into admitting their connivance with Claudius. He then seems to take them into his confidence, the lie out of the way so to speak, but he may be playing with them. Branagh plays him as sometimes vulnerable, sometimes mad, sometimes angry, giving them knowing, ironic looks. For example, he starts "What a piece of work is a man" while looking at Guildenstern, an edified man he will bring down in the course of the speech. He also looks at each of his friends in turn when he mentions the hawk and the handsaw, playing on the joke that the characters are nearly identical, but also saying that he knows friends from enemies.
For their part, they don't quite know what to make of him, and where Horatio seems to be on the same page as the prince, their interactions are often inappropriate. They are OLD friends in a very real sense (as opposed to LONG-TIME friends). They are only comfortable in nostalgia. They can handle banter and theatrical gossip, but they can't deal with Hamlet's depression or flights of poetry. This culminates in their turning one of the play's key speeches into a gay joke, their chuckling visibly insulting Hamlet. They revert to childhood when interacting with their childhood friend.
The theatrical gossip section is not often played, and Branagh wastes as little time as possible, making the rapid-fire discussion so quick it's hard to really get any meaning out of it. So why is it there (in the text)? It of course tells us something about R&G and Hamlet. Thematically, they're also talking about pretenders. Young actors coming on the scene and stealing the work of more established ones, their worthiness in question. Hamlet relates this to his uncle usurping the throne - and getting the two suck-ups to laugh along with his joke - and condemns "fashion" for elevating both. And then there are the pretenders that are R&G, ironically trying to elevate themselves like the "boys" did. So while Branagh does not necessarily convince us that this section needs to be in play, it does support many of the play's ideas.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern

In the next sequence, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern finally catch up to Hamlet. Though in the guise of old school chums, they are really there at the King's behest to spy on the prince. This does not mean they have to be sinister figures. They may, in fact, have Hamlet's best interest at heart (as does the Queen who first sent for them), but they do find themselves at cross-purposes with Hamlet. It is perhaps telling that their conversation is not in blank verse. Scenes with Horatio, who has a similar relationship with Hamlet on the surface (school friends), are still in verse. Do R&G not rate the heightened language of the Court? Where Hamlet treats Horatio as an equal (and at times, even a better), he talks down to R&G, bringing himself to their level and basically running circles around them. It may be interesting to note that when R&G do speak in verse (to the King and Queen, for example), they do so at their own peril, paranoid and halting in their delivery. This is a world they aspire to, but which is forever out of reach. Hamlet has outgrown them.

The sequence also contains the quotable "What a piece of work is a man" speech. As with the previous sequence, here's a link to a website that offers video comparison between more Hamlets than I'm doing. You can compare yourself. But first, lets look at the text itself, in italics to differentiate it from my own comments:

Enter ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN

LORD POLONIUS: You go to seek the Lord Hamlet; there he is.
ROSENCRANTZ: [To POLONIUS] God save you, sir!
Exit POLONIUS

GUILDENSTERN: My honoured lord!
ROSENCRANTZ: My most dear lord!
HAMLET: My excellent good friends! How dost thou, Guildenstern? Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do ye both?
ROSENCRANTZ: As the indifferent children of the earth.
GUILDENSTERN: Happy, in that we are not over-happy;
On fortune's cap we are not the very button.
HAMLET: Nor the soles of her shoe?
ROSENCRANTZ: Neither, my lord.

This sums up the duo's place in Denmark. They have a tenuous connection to the Royal family, but have not yet managed to rise to inner Court which the aspire to. They'll go on to jealously wonder why Hamlet, who to them, is at the very top of the social scale, feels he is at its bottom.

HAMLET: Then you live about her waist, or in the middle of her favours?
GUILDENSTERN: 'Faith, her privates we.
HAMLET: In the secret parts of fortune? O, most true; she is a strumpet. What's the news?

It amuses me that this coarse joke has been removed from my pocket copy of the play, published for use in the school room. Beyond the joke itself, it is telling that Hamlet considers Fortune to be a whore who raised his murderous uncle to the loftiest position in the land, and in so doing, makes a statement about his own mother who let Claudius climb on top of her. It continues Hamlet's motif of linking adultery and sexual sin to the female principle.

ROSENCRANTZ: None, my lord, but that the world's grown honest.
HAMLET: Then is doomsday near: but your news is not true. Let me question more in particular: what have you, my good friends, deserved at the hands of fortune, that she sends you to prison hither?
GUILDENSTERN: Prison, my lord!
HAMLET: Denmark's a prison.
ROSENCRANTZ: Then is the world one.
HAMLET: A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards and dungeons, Denmark being one o' the worst.

The reader may well find that this line foreshadows the final fate of R&G, so long as one imagines a short stay in a dungeon before their execution.

ROSENCRANTZ: We think not so, my lord.
HAMLET: Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison.
ROSENCRANTZ: Why then, your ambition makes it one; 'tis too narrow for your mind.

I've often found that people ascribe their own motivations to others. Those who act in bad faith assume bad faith on the part of others, and so on. How R&G interpret Hamlet's words tells us more about their own thought process than Hamlet's. They are motivated by ambition; he is not. It does beggar the question as to whether they believe Hamlet should be on the throne by filial right. Are they fishing for answers and testing their own theory for Hamlet's distemper? And if that is their belief, the characters would be trapped between a rock and a hard place trying to please both the pretender King and the would-be King, so as to stay in both's good graces. Their death sentence is signed not by their choosing the wrong side (they don't know they're carrying orders to have Hamlet put to death), but for hedging their bets and not choosing a side at all (except their own).

HAMLET: O God, I could be bounded in a nut shell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.
GUILDENSTERN: Which dreams indeed are ambition, for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
HAMLET: A dream itself is but a shadow.
ROSENCRANTZ: Truly, and I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality that it is but a shadow's shadow.
HAMLET: Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and outstretched heroes the beggars' shadows. Shall we to the court? for, by my fay, I cannot reason.

One of two connections made between beggars and kings in the play. Hamlet is consistently deflating his own royalty and that of others. It's part of the fatalism of the play - we all return to the earth in the end - as well as a slight to the current King - if he can be king, then anyone can. This particular line mirrors R&G's own ambitions, the shadows/dreams being their own. Hamlet likens them to beggars, which they are. They beg for attention and power.

ROSENCRANTZ GUILDENSTERN: We'll wait upon you.
HAMLET: No such matter: I will not sort you with the rest of my servants, for, to speak to you like an honest man, I am most dreadfully attended. But, in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore?
ROSENCRANTZ: To visit you, my lord; no other occasion.
HAMLET: Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks; but I thank you: and sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a halfpenny. Were you not sent for? Is it your own inclining? Is it a free visitation? Come, deal justly with me: come, come; nay, speak.

Again, Hamlet confuses a Royal for a beggar. In this case, himself. The theme of this sequence will eventually bloom in "What a piece of work is a man" in which Hamlet

GUILDENSTERN: What should we say, my lord?
HAMLET: Why, any thing, but to the purpose. You were sent for; and there is a kind of confession in your looks which your modesties have not craft enough to colour: I know the good king and queen have sent for you.
ROSENCRANTZ: To what end, my lord?
HAMLET: That you must teach me. But let me conjure you, by the rights of our fellowship, by the consonancy of our youth, by the obligation of our ever-preserved love, and by what more dear a better proposer could charge you withal, be even and direct with me, whether you were sent for, or no?
ROSENCRANTZ: [Aside to GUILDENSTERN] What say you?
HAMLET: [Aside] Nay, then, I have an eye of you.--If you love me, hold not off.
GUILDENSTERN: My lord, we were sent for.
HAMLET: I will tell you why; so shall my anticipation prevent your discovery, and your secrecy to the king and queen moult no feather. I have of late--but wherefore I know not--lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so.
ROSENCRANTZ: My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts.
HAMLET: Why did you laugh then, when I said 'man delights not me'?
ROSENCRANTZ: To think, my lord, if you delight not in man, what lenten entertainment the players shall receive from you: we coted them on the way; and hither are they coming, to offer you service.

As part of the various inversions in this section of Scene 2 is the change of tone taking us from Hamlet's sublime and fatalistic speech to R&G laughing at a gay joke. This is another sign that R&G are just on Hamlet's level, intellectually or poetically. It also acts as a bridge for a conversation about Elizabethan theater. Hamlet is very much about a man putting on a play, and from here to the play within a play, it also becomes about theater itself. This section (along with the later speech to the Players) gives us an idea of what Shakespeare's theater was like, but also tells us there was a lot of what he considers bad theater going on. The sequence starts with Hamlet making an ironic comment in the context of his uncle's usurpation of the throne:

HAMLET: He that plays the king shall be welcome; his majesty shall have tribute of me; the adventurous knight shall use his foil and target; the lover shall not sigh gratis; the humourous man shall end his part in peace; the clown shall make those laugh whose lungs are tickled o' the sere; and the lady shall say her mind freely, or the blank verse shall halt for't. What players are they?
ROSENCRANTZ: Even those you were wont to take delight in, the tragedians of the city.
HAMLET: How chances it they travel? their residence, both in reputation and profit, was better both ways.
ROSENCRANTZ`I think their inhibition comes by the means of the late innovation.
HAMLET: Do they hold the same estimation they did when I was in the city? are they so followed?
ROSENCRANTZ: No, indeed, are they not.
HAMLET: How comes it? do they grow rusty?
ROSENCRANTZ: Nay, their endeavour keeps in the wonted pace: but there is, sir, an aery of children, little eyases, that cry out on the top of question, and are most tyrannically clapped for't: these are now the fashion, and so berattle the common stages--so they call them--that many wearing rapiers are afraid of goose-quills and dare scarce come thither.
HAMLET: What, are they children? who maintains 'em? how are they escoted? Will they pursue the quality no longer than they can sing? will they not say afterwards, if they should grow themselves to common players--as it is most like, if their means are no better--their writers do them wrong, to make them exclaim against their own succession?
ROSENCRANTZ: 'Faith, there has been much to do on both sides; and the nation holds it no sin to tarre them to controversy: there was, for a while, no money bid for argument, unless the poet and the player went to cuffs in the question.
HAMLET: Is't possible?
GUILDENSTERN: O, there has been much throwing about of brains.
HAMLET: Do the boys carry it away?
ROSENCRANTZ: Ay, that they do, my lord; Hercules and his load too.
HAMLET: It is not very strange; for mine uncle is king of Denmark, and those that would make mows at him while my father lived, give twenty, forty, fifty, an hundred ducats a-piece for his picture in little. 'Sblood, there is something in this more than natural, if philosophy could find it out.

Are we to understand that Shakespeare, at this point in his career, felt the sting of competition? It's the same today: Things that are popular are not necessarily good art. It's what makes people hide behind the idea that quality is all subjective, when clearly, it is not. At the end of this oft deleted conversation, Hamlet brings things back to his situation, comparing Claudius to bad theater, popular but lacking in quality.

Flourish of trumpets within

GUILDENSTERN: There are the players.
HAMLET: Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore. Your hands, come then: the appurtenance of welcome is fashion and ceremony: let me comply with you in this garb, lest my extent to the players, which, I tell you, must show fairly outward, should more appear like entertainment than yours. You are welcome: but my uncle-father and aunt-mother are deceived.
GUILDENSTERN: In what, my dear lord?
HAMLET: I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw.

At the very end, Hamlet lets slip something of the truth. It may not be right to say that he lets down his guard exactly, because the comment, at least to R&G's ears, is coded. It is not the only time that Hamlet sounds mad even as he tells us he isn't.

II.ii. The Fishmonger Scene - French Rock Opera

Halliday's Fishmonger Scene does away with Polonius entirely and makes it about Hamlet's reading, and in so doing gives us a reflective, personal song that intersects with various ideas in the play. You can listen to it HERE, and I follow the text with a rough translation.

Je lis
Quand la vie est jolie, jolie, je lis
Quand il fait triste, et il fait gris, je lis
Quand je suis seul dans mon lit, je lis
Quand même les rêves me fuient, je lis
Quand je cherche un coin d’oubli, je lis
Quand j’ai besoin d’un alibi, je lis
Quand on me sonne l'hallali, je lis
Quand je perds le goût de la vie, je lis
Quand je lis, je lis, je lis quoi ?
Des mots…

I read
When life is pretty, pretty, I read
When it is sad, and it is gray, I read
When I'm alone in my bed, I read
When even my dreams desert me, I read
When I look for a forgotten corner, I read
When I need an alibi, I read
When they trumpet the kill, I read
When I lose the taste for life, I read
When I read, I read, I read what?
Words...

The short song has Hamlet reading, rain or shine, homogenizing his life which he will later compare to a prison. Most of the lines speak to his fatalism, undercutting the hopefulness of the first in which the near homonyms jolie (pretty) and je lis (I read) are playfully confused. The song could almost be sung with jolie (pretty) in place of je lis (I read) throughout, extending the irony. Is Ophelia on Hamlet's mind still? Is his loneliness (colored by his reading books, to use Polonius' words in a later scene) making his mind wander from the page to the love of his life? There may lie the contempt one might understand from the "punchline". I'm reminded of the phrase Jonathan Swift wrote on the envelope containing a lock of his dead wife's hair, "Only a woman's hair". The words Hamlet reads are meant to be a refuge, but in no way do they replace the relationships he has broken off. Without the comic context of the Hamlet-Polonius interplay, "words, words, words" takes on some of the meaning behind the "What a rogue and peasant slave am I" speech, in which Hamlet is outraged that he must "unpack his heart with words", or the earlier speech on how his grief cannot be properly contained in "actions that a man might play".

The song reveals a possible staging where "words, words, words" can be pronounced in an aside to take on more personal meaning.

II.ii. The Fishmonger Scene - Classics Illustrated

The original
It is difficult to convey the comedy of the scene, and the original Classics Illustrated doesn't even try, though perhaps it was removed to avoid getting into the fishmonger/pimp metaphor. So in this version, Polonius and Claudius conspire to send Ophelia to meet Hamlet, and though the "To be or not to be" speech immediately follows, their plan comes to fruition thereafter.

The Berkley versionTom Mandrake's adaptation retains the sequence, but makes deep cuts into it, ending it before Polonius asks Hamlet what he's reading. This removes much of Hamlet toying with Polonius - and all my favorite lines! This is a largely humorless adaptation, Mandrake's facial expressions and atmosphere better suited to anxiety and anguish. His Hamlet is deadly serious, and his Polonius a sad old man, bewildered and saddened by events. We lose nothing of the plot, of course, and has Rosencrantz & Guildenstern show up earlier, before Polonius can get even more insulted, which in this vision, sometimes seems unduly harsh.