Laughing Matters: Why Comedy Is Important, Even in Tragedy

HowlRound: I recently found myself leaving the theatre after experiencing an incredibly moving production of Hamlet, put on by Shakespeare’s Globe. Quite frankly, my head was more or less spinning, from both the overall production value and the fact that I had just seen a Globe performance without having to trudge across the pond; the admittedly sexy Hamlet didn’t hurt, either. Among the bevy of your average weeknight theatregoers—the wealthy and overdressed, with the occasional wide-eyed millennial thrown in—one comment kept making its way to the surface in the cacophony: “But why was I laughing during Hamlet?”