Review: Hamlet Hail to the Thief at Factory International is ‘bold, brutal and utterly absorbing’

In the vast, industrial expanse of Manchester’s Factory International, Hamlet: Hail to the Thief strikes with powerful intensity — a feverish collision of Shakespeare’s tragedy and Radiohead’s brooding soundscape that does something rare: it lives up to and exceeds the hype.

Directed by Steven Hoggett and Christine Jones, with a reimagined score by Thom Yorke, this groundbreaking collaboration between the Royal Shakespeare Company and Factory International reinvents Hamlet as a haunting, politically charged spectacle for the 21st century

Fusing Shakespeare’s most psychologically tormented tragedy with the visceral, politically charged energy of Hail to the Thief (Radiohead’s 2003 anti-establishment opus), the production becomes a searing interrogation of power, paranoia, grief and identity.

What could have felt like a clumsy artistic mash-up instead emerges as a dark, dazzling triumph — a reminder of the timeless rage of Hamlet and the enduring power of Yorke’s songwriting.

Despite Yorke’s admission that Hamlet wasn’t on his mind when Hail to the Thief was written, the eerie synchronicities between the two are undeniable.

Both works are fuelled by a sense of moral disintegration and simmering fury. Both ask what happens when the people in charge betray their ideals. Both start with a question.

And in this production, those questions cut like a scalpel.

Hamlet Hail to the Thief at Factory International

At the centre of this maelstrom is Samuel Blenkin’s Hamlet,  and what a Hamlet he is.

Blenkin delivers a masterclass in control and release, veering between biting sarcasm, philosophical despair, and volcanic rage.

With his angular frame, sunken eyes, and ever-spiralling energy, he radiates the kind of restless intelligence that makes you lean forward every time he speaks.

His portrayal is as much vocal as physical. The rhythm of his delivery is precise, yet spontaneous. And he understands Hamlet’s humour, injecting scenes with a kind of unhinged levity that makes the character feel startlingly alive.

Not only is he mourning his murdered father and railing hard against a corrupt world, he is performing his grief, weaponising his wit, challenging everyone, audience included, to question what is true.

In the final stretch, as Hamlet’s fury boils into action and the bodies begin to fall, Blenkin doesn’t flinch. He burns. His final moments are less tragic than transcendent.

Sound, fury, and a resurrection

For Thom Yorke, the project wasn’t just artistic but personal.

Revisiting Hail to the Thief, a record he once felt had “turned to sh*t” in the final stages of production, he’s now re-forged it into something new and thrilling.

While Yorke in the programme notes suggested that ‘applying music to Shakespeare seemed like a kind of sacrilege’, The audience must have been thrilled they did, as they delicately intertwined, augmenting the action on stage, never detracting.

The score is very far removed from simply a jukebox medley of Radiohead hits. Instead, Yorke has re-orchestrated fragments and themes from the album, embedding them into the soul of the play.

Both Thom Yorke and Phil Selway from Radiohead were both present to see their work transformed.

The band, seen through hazy panes on the lower level of the set, plays in spectral silhouette. Above them, two vocalists, Megan Hill and Ed Begley, act like Greek choristers or ghosts, their voices weaving in and out of the action. Sometimes, the actors take over vocal duties, singing lyrics that echo their psychological states.

It’s a haunting device, and it works. Ophelia’s (a fierce, no-compromises Ami Tredrea) unravelling is paired with a fractured rendition of Sail to the Moon, her voice quivering with childlike melody and menace. Hamlet’s return to Elsinore is underscored by Scatterbrain, reimagined as a ghostly falsetto ballad that feels like it’s crawling up from the underworld. The death of Polonius is met with the thunderclap of There, There, an explosion of guilt and consequence.

Rarely have songs been used so surgically in theatre — not merely as mood-setters, but as narrative propulsion.

Stripped back, amped up

The staging itself is stark but richly suggestive. Designed by the AMP collective and Sadra Tehrani, the split-level castle set, wrapped in dry ice and stark lighting by Jessica Hung Han Yun, evokes a kind of post-industrial purgatory. Fender amps line the stage like gravestones. The court dances, grotesquely and obliviously, to Go to Sleep, a moment that says more about the rot at the heart of Denmark than any monologue could.

And though the play runs just two hours,  a brisk trot for Hamlet, nothing feels rushed.

Hoggett’s physical sequences do the heavy lifting when words aren’t enough: bodies twist and collapse in synchronised chaos, reflecting a world that has slipped its moral axis.

 A faultless cast ensemble

Beyond Blenkin, the ensemble is faultless. Paul Hilton doubles as both the slippery Claudius and the mournful Ghost, a performance that conjures both menace and regret. Claudia Harrison as Gertrude balances maternal warmth with a dawning horror at the world she’s trapped in.

Annabel Baldwin is a grounded and observant Horatio, never missing a beat. Brandon Grace brings real weight to Laertes, while James Cooney and Felipe Pacheco’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are comic but never cartoonish.

Tom Peters plays Polonius not as a bumbling fool, but a well-meaning man tragically out of depth, while Romaya Weaver’s Gravedigger brings a moment of eerie levity that cuts through the gloom.

Each performer is clearly dialled into the musical and emotional rhythms of the show,  responding to a sonic world that constantly shifts beneath their feet.

The ghost in the machine

It would be easy to see Hamlet Hail to the Thief as a gimmick — Shakespeare meets Radiohead, high art meets alternative rock.

But to call it that is to miss the point entirely. What this production understands — in its bones — is that both Shakespeare and Yorke are chroniclers of collapse. Both ask how we survive in the ruins of broken systems. Both give voice to the voiceless, the angry, the alienated.

Christine Jones’s remark that the Hail to the Thief tour “changed [her] DNA” makes sense here. You can feel that same sense of personal transformation in every aspect of the show.

It’s a resurrection. It’s Shakespeare’s most famous play for a generation shaped by dread and distrust — the heirs of both Hamlet and Yorke’s paranoia.

Hamlet: Hail to the Thief is a revelation — bold, brutal, and utterly absorbing.

It captures the restless heart of Shakespeare’s tragedy and refracts it through the fractured lens of one of the 21st century’s most interesting albums. The result is electric. Unmissable. And perhaps most importantly, unforgettable.

Tickets for Hamlet: Hail to the Thief

Hamlet Hail to the Thief is on at Factory International from the 27th of April to the 18th of May 2025.

You can get tickets by clicking here