Cultural references to Hamlet

Numerous references to Hamlet in popular culture (in film, literatire, arts, etc.) reflect the continued influence of this play, which is probably the most popular of Shakespeare's plays, judging by the number of productions.

Film

A number of films have also used lines from Hamlet's soliloquy as film titles. See To be, or not to be for a list of these films.

• The Disney movie The Lion King is partly based on Hamlet.
• In the Onimusha video game series, many of the Genma bosses are named after some of the characters in Hamlet: Fortinbras is the Genma King, Rosencrantz Guildenstern is the evil genma scientist, Claudius one of guildensterns greates creations and a formidable foe for samanosuke, Ophelia, Gertrude is the Genma hound dog, Guildenstern, Osric, Reynaldo (Sent to spy on laertes) is also one of the names of one of guildensterns creations and a smaller genma you battle throughout the series and marcellus, the first of guildensterns creations and the first boss in Onimusha I
• A King in New York (1957), directed by Charlie Chaplin, includes a scene in which Chaplin recites the "to be or not to be" speech, and is arguably on a par with other famous renditions.
• Tom Stoppard's popular play and movie Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead depicts the two title characters contemplating their roles as minor players in a bigger drama. Occasional scenes are taken directly from Hamlet.
• Tom Stoppard also has a short entitled The Fifteen Minute Hamlet which includes Philip Seymour Hoffman in the cast. The fifteen minute version is followed by an even shorter version.
• Hamlet Goes Business (Hamlet liikemaailmassa) (1987) by Aki Kaurismäki is a comic reworking of the story as a power struggle in a rubber duck factory.
• Episode 43 of Monty Python's Flying Circus (1974) is entitled Hamlet.
• The 1969 film The Magic Christian includes a scene where Guy Grand (Peter Sellers) has bribed a famous actor to perform "To be or not to be ..." as a strip-tease.
• The comedy Strange Brew (1983) is loosely based on Hamlet. Among other jokes, scenes take place at Elsinore Brewery. However, the state of denmark is replaced by the ownership of elsinore brewery and hamlet is portrayed as a woman.
• The Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991) character General Chang, a Klingon officer, was a Shakespeare aficionado, and opined that Shakespearian works were best experienced in the "original" Klingon. Indeed, Klingonists Nick Nicholas and Andrew Strader in 1996 published The Klingon Hamlet — a Klingon translation of the play. The Klingon version of the famous quote, which Chang recites in the film, is taH pagh taHbe' .
• Hamlet features strongly in the film Renaissance Man, in which Danny DeVito's character uses its plot and characters to introduce a group of under-achieving soldiers to critical thinking.
• In a Gilligan's Island episode entitled "The Producer," the castaways put on a musical production of Hamlet set to the music of Carmen.
• The Simpsons offered a shortened version of Hamlet in the episode "Tales from the Public Domain". After this, Homer claims that Hamlet was made into the film Ghostbusters.
• Transformers Beast Wars mirrored Hamlet's death in the episode "Code of Hero" in which former Predacon Dinobot takes on the entire Predacon team without backup utimately saving humanity before it evolved into today's current existence. With his Maximal comrades he quotes, "Tell my story, tell it truly, the good and the bad; and let me be judged accordingly. The rest is silence."
• The Brak Show referenced the basic plot of Hamlet in the episode "Braklet, Prince of Spaceland". In the episode, Brak's father is killed by Zorak, who also hypnotizes Brak's mother into believing that the two are married. Brak's father appears as a ghost, and informs Brak what has happened. Brak goes insane and makes a movie of the murder, which he shows to Zorak.
• The action movie and comedy film Last Action Hero starts with Arnold Schwarzenegger starring in the advert of a (fictional)action movie that is an adaptation of Hamlet.
• There was an episode of South Park in which Terrance and Philip's professional relationship failed, resulting in one of them moving to Canada to become a Shakespearean actor, subsequently performing Hamlet with other Canadian actors, with the ending of the play being shown in the episode.
• Egyptian director Youssef Chahine frequently cites from Hamlet in his films. His films Alexandria... Why? (1978) and Alexandria... New York(2004) feature performances of soliliquies. In Alexandria Again and Forever (1990) Hamlet appears as a film within the film.
• Princess Diaries 2: The Royal Engagement. Lily, the Princess Mia's best friend, refers to Mia's two chambermaids as "Rosencrantz" and "Guildenstern"
• René (Robert Lepage) quotes part of the "To Be or Not to Be" soliloquy during his portion of The Passion Play in the 1989 film Jésus de Montréal. The film also refers to Hamlet in its trailer.
• The Ninth Configuration featured mentally ill soldiers in an asylum, one of whom wants to stage an all-dog production of Hamlet — the title role, of course, going to a Great Dane.
• In Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, Harold and Kumar are neighbors of "Rosenberg and Goldstein", a Jewish mockery of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern. Also, Harold's love interest Maria visits the "Ophelia" movie theater.
• In Tales from the Crypt in the episode "Top Billing", a group of insane playwrights are attempting to stage a performance of Hamlet, and all they need is a skull.
• The "To Be Or Not To Be" soliloquy is used in the RTS game Age of Empires III, created by Ensemble Studios.
• In the cult British comedy film Withnail & I, Withnail's uncle Monty reminisces about giving up acting on realising that he would "never play the Dane" — how at that moment in a young man's life all ambition ceases. Withnail says it is a part he intends to play. The film finishes with Withnail in the rain making the speech from Hamlet "I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth" to some captive wolves.
• The play has been referenced in the 2003 remake of Freaky Friday. In an English class, the play is discussed, and in the course of the scene, the quote from the 1948 film starring Laurence Olivier is used as the answer to the question "Describe the character of Hamlet." The answer: "A man who couldn't make up his mind."
• In Dan Brown's book, Digital Fortress, former military man-turned-NSA employee Greg Hale quotes from the play: "There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
• In an episode of the American TV series ER titled "Secrets and Lies," Dr. Kovac mentions that he played Hamlet while attending college in Croatia. When he was asked if he performed it in English or Croatian, he replied, "Croatian. Why would I perform it in English?" Dr. Carter then says he played Horatio and starts reciting the "To Be or Not To Be" soliloquy. When he starts to get the lines wrong, Kovac corrects him, first in English and then continues reciting the lines in Croatian.
• In the Star Trek The Next Generation episode "Hide and Q" Captain Picard quotes Hamlet: "What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god!" (II.ii.304-308).
• In the film Grosse Pointe Blank, one character recites to another: "What a piece of work is man! How noble... oh, **** it, let's have a drink and forget the whole damn thing."
• In the film The Big Lebowski Walter says, "Goodnight, sweet prince" at Donny's funeral.
• In both Tales of Interest Futurama episodes Bender's death is followed by the line "Goodnight, sweet prince."
• A recent successor to Inspector Morse, Inspector Lewis, aired an episode called "Lewis and the Ghost of Inspector Morse" which has many direct and indirect references to the play, and indeed Inspector Lewis uses a clue from his dead mentor to solve the case, an eerie parallel
• In Asterix and the Great Crossing Hamlet is referenced in two quotes by Danish vikings. One says: "There is something rotten in my kingdom", while holding a skull in his hand. Another one wonders whether he is a discoverer or not and thus says: "To be or not to be; that's the question."
• In the video game Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, after defeating Nupraptor and obtaining his head, the player can examine it in their inventory. Doing so prompts the character Kain to remark "Alas, poor Nupraptor, I knew him well. Well... not really."
• There is also an episode of the original Star Trek series entitled "The Conscience of the King," in which a production of Hamlet is put on, with the episode itself parodying much of Hamlet.
• HamLeT is also the term for a ham, lettuce, and tomato sandwich — like a BLT only with (Danish?) ham instead of bacon — which has inspired the doubtful HamLeT's Sandwich Soliloquy.
• Hamlet is quoted in the Neil Jordan film, 'Interview With the Vampire'. Claudia, the child-vampire, quotes "Goodnight sweet prince, may flights of devils sing thee to thy rest."
• In the Canadian television series Slings and Arrows, the famous actor Geoffrey Tennant returns to the New Burbage Theatre Festival, the site of his greatest triumph and most humiliating failure, to assume the Artistic Directorship after the sudden death of his mentor, Oliver Welles. When Geoffrey returns to the theatre, he finds that it is haunted by the ghost of the recently departed Oliver. Oliver and Geoffrey's interactions are comically reminiscent of the dialogue between Hamlet and the ghost of his father. With Oliver haunting him, Geoffrey directs a remarkable production of Hamlet. The cast includes Due South's Paul Gross, Rachel MacAdams, and Mark McKinney.
• In the video game Xenosaga episode 1 "der wille zur macht" Albedo has a quote saying "frailty thy name is woman"

Literature

• In his novel Ulysses, James Joyce includes a lengthy discussion about Hamlet, referring to it as one of a select few important artworks that outshine the rest.

"Art has to reveal to us ideas, formless spiritual essences. The supreme question about a work of art is out of how deep a life does it spring? The painting of Gustave Moreau is painting of ideas, the deepest poetry of Shelley, the words of Hamlet bring our mind into contact with the eternal wisdom, Plato's world of ideas. All the rest is the speculation of schoolboys for schoolboys."

• Gertrude and Claudius, a John Updike novel, serves as a prequel to the events of the play. It follows Gertrude from her wedding to King Hamlet, through an affair with Claudius, and its murderous results, up until the very beginning of the play.
• Ophelia's Revenge, a novel by Rebecca Reisert, tells the story of Hamlet from Ophelia's point of view.
• Anton Chekhov wrote a feuilleton titled I am a Moscow Hamlet (1891), the mutterings of a gossip-mongering actor who contemplates suicide out of sheer boredom.
• Arthur Rimbaud wrote a long poem on Ophelia, likely inspired by a reproduction of the Waterhouse painting.
• In the novel The Journey of The Fool, Faust Amoyo tries to think of all books that can be written in 200 pages, he laughs when he speculates a version of Hamlet where the word is everywhere replaced by 'Danish Butthead'.
• In the novel Something Rotten, Jasper Fforde includes Hamlet as a major character.
• Throughout Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, the character John ("the Savage") quotes Hamlet, among other plays by Shakespeare.
• Richard Curtis's Skinhead Hamlet, a brief, very rude, parody of the play which, according to the editors is meant to be:

"Shakespeare's play translated into modern English. Our hope was to achieve something like the effect of the New English Bible. --Eds."

Music

At least 26 operas have been written based on Hamlet, including:

• Ambleto, by Francesco Gasparini (1706)
• Ambleto, by Domenico Scarlatti (1715)
• Amleto, by Gaetano Andreozzi (1792)
• Amleto, by Franco Faccio (libretto by Arrigo Boito) (1865)
• Hamlet, by Ambroise Thomas (1868)
• Hamlet, by Humphrey Searle (1968)
• Hamlet (?), by Sandor Szokolay (year?)

Sergei Prokofiev also wrote incidental music to the play.

Instrumental works based on Hamlet include:

• Nocturne in G Minor, Op. 15 No. 3 by Frédéric Chopin, inspired by Hamlet
• Hamlet (1858), symphonic poem by Franz Liszt
• Hamlet and Ophelia, symphonic poems by Edward MacDowell
• Hamlet (1888), Fantasy Overture in F Minor, Op. 67 by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
• Hamlet (1888), Incidental music for a Russian stage production of the play, also by Tchaikovsky. This production used an edited version of the Fantasy Overture.
• Hamlet, the score for the 1963 film, by Dmitri Shostakovich.
• There is a willow grows aslant a brook, a symphonic poem by Frank Bridge, based on the speech of Queen Gertrude about the death of Ophelia.

Contemporary popular music includes:

• "What a Piece of Work is Man" from the 1967 musical Hair is Hamlet's speech from Act 2 Scene 2 set to music.
• The Dream Theater song "Pull Me Under" is influenced by, and makes reference to, Hamlet.
• Lou Reed's song "Goodnight Ladies", from his 1972 album Transformer, uses a line from Ophelia's mad speech (Act 4, Scene 5) as its chorus. In the song Hang on to Your Emotions from the Set the Twilight Reeling album, he refers to Ophelia and Hamlet (and also, perhaps mistakenly, to Desdemona).
• Darling Violetta's song "Ophelia", from the band's debut album Bath-Water-Flowers, references Ophelia's death/suicide.
• Rasputina's song "Dig Ophelia" from the debut album Thanks for the Ether also references the death of Ophelia.
• Your Forgotten Love has a song entitled "Her Fair Judgment", with lyrics rearranged from Ophelia's mad speech.
• Arcturus' first album, Aspera Hiems Symfonia, makes reference to Hamlet's most famous soliloquy in the song The Bodkin & The Quietus.
• Folk singer Jewel makes a reference to Ophelia's suicide in the song "Innocence Maintained": Ophelia drowned in the water/pushed by her own weight.
• the title track of the album Elsinore by swedish musician Björn Afzelius is about a prince locked up in the castle of Elsinore.
• End Of All Hope, a song by Finnish metal band Nightwish, contains the line "The rest is silence".
• Bands Flaming Youth takes its name from the text , as does This Mortal Coil (from the end of the "To be or not to be" speech).
• The Band recorded a song called "Ophelia," released on their album Northern Lights - Southern Cross.
• Bob Dylan references Ophelia in the songs Desolation Row and Po' Boy.
• Abney Park has a song titled "Dear Ophelia" which is a theoretical letter from Hamlet to Ophelia
• Emilie Autumn has a song entitled "Opheliac" wherein the chorus references the drowning.
• Beyonce Knowles uses "To be, or Not to Be," as the first line in her song Freakum Dress on her 2006 album 'B'day'
• The Elephant 6 band name A Hawk and a Hacksaw paraphrases Hamlet's '...I know a hawk from a handsaw'.
• Richard Thompson, british singer/songwriter, sings a live version of The Story Of Hamlet on "The Life And Music Of - CD 4 - The Songs Pour Down Like Silver". The interpretation is not terribly serious ("Like a hole in the head, Denmark needed that prince").