James IjamessFat Hamdoesnt just break the fourth wall it bulldozes it.
Fat Hamis now playing at the American Airlines Theatre.
Save this article to read it later.
Find this story in your accountsSaved for Latersection.
Fat Hamwants you to talk.
It begins abruptly, and sans disclaimer, with a character watching OnlyFans on his phone.
From that point on, the audience is aware: This is not the space for inhibition.
Here, shouting Kiss!
at characters during tense confessional scenes is the norm, and dialogue between audience and actors is encouraged.
Its broad plot beats mirrorHamlet, butFat Hamhas no rigid adherence to the original.
I think,How many things can I throw in their direction?
Its not surgical; its a sledgehammer.
When the end of the show happens and everybodys on their feet, theres something churning.
The project of the play is creating space for joy and transformation.
You called Shakespeare an archaic form.
Why is it worth reinvigorating?I dont mean that in a bad way.
I mean that in the sense that it is old.
We dont speak that way anymore.
The first Shakespearean play I read wasJulius Caesarin middle school, and I would talk about it constantly.
Those plays have always been intriguing to me, but I wasnt allowed into them.
I did graduate from school for acting, and that reaffirmed the things I was afraid of with Shakespeare.
When I started to writeFat Ham, leading up to the 2016 election, I realizedHamletis mine, too.
Why did you feel distanced from Shakespeare initially?Some of it was how it was taught to me.
In middle- and high school, it was strictly literary.
I went to Morehouse, a historically Black college, where it wasnt central.
They were more interested in the Greeks than they were with Shakespeare.
I was like,I dont have that thick of an accent.
One person said that my default was to move to rage.
That sounds racially coded.Super-coded, right?
I dont think they even realized how coded.
AndIdidnt realize how coded it was.
Who did you play?Benvolio.
Im perpetually Benvolio levelheaded, kind, wants everybody to get along.
InHamlet, I would be Horatio.
Thats opposed to the rage your teachers were invoking.Which is what was interesting.
It made me keep my distance from it.
As a playwright, Im self-taught.
Do you buy into abuse or alcoholism?
What is your relationship to what youve inherited thats now a part of your DNA?
I was like, What if he didnt?
I felt like,This is history repeating itself.
The relationship between the son and the mother inHamletoften gets played as Oedipal.
How did you go about adapting that relationship?In ShakespearesHamlet, it is definitely uncomfortable.
I knew I didnt want to do that.
It feels uncomfortable because she cant expect him to be her whole world.
In drama, to have a release of joy you have to have tension beforehand.
I dont like that you speak in a way I dont understand.
Anybody can experience that.
The tension is people stuff.
Its also a play that is largely devoid of the white gaze.
The racial power dynamic isnt present.
I dont explain Blackness to the audience.
Theres stuff in that story I wont readily understand, but I can enjoy what Im experiencing.
The intervention thatFat Hamis doing is not just with the script but with the shows relationship to the audience.
It was a crowd.
Each person has a relationship to whats onstage.
Its been interesting being in previews, because Im manicuring it now.
Im listening to the audience.
How can I gather as many people as possible around this to have an experience together?
Thats what Shakespeare did.
This was perhaps the most responsive audience Ive ever been in on Broadway.
When you walk in theres no preshow music.
You become comfortable with the sound of audience in the space.
Im not afraid of taking sharp turns, and that elicits vocal responses from people.
Theres this moment where Juicy does something really awful to the character Larry, and then Larry retaliates.
But we dont expect him to.
Every single time its like theyre watching a horror movie.
You make them feel like they have space.
People want to feel like they can kick back and be themselves.
He wants to know what I think, and how do I tell em what I think?
I laugh, I cry.
I go, uh-oh.
That starts to happen the moment they realize that there is no fourth wall.
Why dont you like the fourth wall?Its just not as fun.
Having no fourth wall allows the world to be bigger.
Theres a set of plays where it works really well.
So you need that protection.
But theres no fourth wall in Shakespeare, and theres no fourth wall in the Greeks.
Saying I dont like the fourth wall is me being in line with the vast majority of theatrical history.
You won a Pulitzer before premiering your show live for the majority of the audiences that have seen it.
He was saying, It just made me laugh so much.
But then I was like,wake up!
Im asking,If I really push myself, what do the plays start to look like for me?
In which direction do you want to push yourself?Scale.
I want to build plays where the world is bigger.
Id love to do that.
And thats really difficult, because then you have to imagine one.
You cant just slam your hands on the computer.
Youve got to go full Tolkien.Youve got to go full Tolkien.
I love comic books and sci-fi.
Im working on a play now that Im hoping will feel like horror.
Its about artificial intelligence and implicit bias.
Im trying to figure out how that genre can work onstage and make people uneasy.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
Thank you for subscribing and supporting our journalism.
