OCC Theater Faculty Zips Through Hamlet on Farmington Hills Campus

Normally, it takes more than four hours to get through Shakespeare's classic Hamlet. But a group of Oakland Community College theater faculty members cut the play down to two hours Thursday morning. 

A staged reading held in Smith Theater on the  in Farmington Hills presented selected scenes, amplified by the school's resident Shakespeare expert, English Department faculty member John Mitchell. He provided information about Hamlet's origins, which lie in an 11th century Viking saga, along with insights into the play. 

"It's a play about plays," Mitchell said, adding a central theme is that "theater itself is about how people exist. We are always actors." 

The reading was open to the public as a prelude to the theatre program’s production of Tom Stoppard’s , which the author derived from Hamlet. Performances are scheduled for March 22-24, and 29-31 in the Smith Theatre. General admission is $8 (students and seniors $5). All performances begin at 8 p.m.