{"id":14253,"date":"2025-02-13T13:32:39","date_gmt":"2025-02-13T13:32:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/?p=14253"},"modified":"2025-02-13T13:53:06","modified_gmt":"2025-02-13T13:53:06","slug":"grand-theft-hamlet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.reading.ac.uk\/connected\/2025\/02\/13\/grand-theft-hamlet\/","title":{"rendered":"Grand Theft Hamlet"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Grand Theft Auto<\/em> and Shakespeare are not two things you would normally put together. But Reading alumnus, Mark Oosterveen, did exactly that when he staged a production of\u00a0Hamlet<\/em> within the\u00a0Grand Theft Auto<\/em> video game world.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Mark
Mark by Wolf Marloh<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mark, who graduated in 2003 from the University of Reading with a degree in English, film and drama<\/a>, shared that this project was created from a fear of the future during the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021.<\/p>\n

Mark is an actor, and prior to the pandemic he was mainly working in theatre and doing voiceover work, with the occasional film or TV acting role. It was a passion he\u2019d discovered during his time at university. \u201cIt\u2019s a bit of a clich\u00e9 but my time at Reading was where I figured out what I wanted to do as a person, what I wanted to do for a living and what sort of person I was,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cI immersed myself in English, film and theatre as well as the Drama Society. The University had a vibrant, artsy atmosphere, and I began to think more seriously about a career in that sphere.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Drama Society would put on Shakespeare productions every summer on the grass between the Students\u2019 Union and the Library. It was always a big event. This is what really sparked my interest in Shakespeare, and gave me ideas about how to radically stage Shakespeare. I have many happy memories of these productions.\u201d<\/p>\n

A digital theatre<\/strong><\/h4>\n

One day during the COVID-19 lockdown, Mark\u2019s fellow actor friend \u2013 Sam Crane \u2013 had one of the most radical ideas about how to stage Shakespeare \u2013 within Grand Theft Auto <\/em>(GTA). This spark of an idea led to Grand Theft Hamlet<\/em> \u2013 a feature documentary film directed by Pinny Grylls and Sam Crane, which follows Sam and Mark as they attempt to produce a live virtual production of Shakespeare\u2019s play in an entirely digital, and violent, environment.<\/p>\n

Watch the trailer on MUBI:<\/p>\n