Grand Theft Hamlet poster

2024·91 min·Released

Grand Theft Hamlet

Animation
Documentary

Two unemployed friends have a fresh idea: they want to stage Shakespeare's 'Hamlet' in Grand Theft Auto. But even in a virtual world, reality intrudes in a wild and trippy film shot entirely inside the ultra-violent video game.

6.6(61 votes)

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Videos

Official US Trailer

Cast & Crew

Sam Crane

Sam Crane

Hamlet (voice)

Pinny Grylls

Pinny Grylls

Filmmaker (voice)

Jen Cohn

Jen Cohn

Horatio (voice)

Tilly Steele

Tilly Steele

Ophelia (voice)

Dipo Ola

Dipo Ola

Laertes (voice)

Mark Oosterveen

Mark Oosterveen

Polonius (voice)

Gareth Turkington

Gareth Turkington

Claudius (voice)

Lizzie Wofford

Lizzie Wofford

Gertrude (voice)

Sam Forster

Sam Forster

Rozencrantz (voice)

Jeremiah O'Connor

Jeremiah O'Connor

Ghost / Player King (voice)

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CinemaSerf

Written on 12/7/2024

Lockdown played havoc with so many lives, but professionally none more so than those in the entertainment industry. With theatres and cinemas all closed, their livelihoods dried up and a serious degree of ennui crept in to their day to day lives. One escape from that was "Grand Theft Auto" and that's where we meet jobbing actors Sam Crane and Mark Oosterveen. Two forty-somethings who were dealing with this situation by shooting as many folks as they could online. The former lives with Pinny and has a couple of kids, the latter lives on his own and is struggling to find some sort of motivation. It's whilst playing the game one day that they find an outdoor auditorium and hit on the idea of performing "Hamlet" there. Swiftly they realise that standing on the stage belting out the best of the bard is only going to get their characters shot, then that two folks aren't going to be able to cover all the roles - so they embark on a project to recruit other players to fill the roles. What now ensues sees these men introduced to some serious would-be Thespians, some folks who think he wrote "Harry Potter" and some generally eclectic characters who all decide that this can be done after all. I'm not sure Shakespeare could ever have envisaged his play being put on using warplanes or giant blimps whilst the actors faced real peril (though I am sure we've all seen plays on stage where that might have been a benefit!) but as the two men start to become more absorbed with there mission it starts to become just as compelling to watch. Can they do it? How is their obsession impacting on their "real" lives? I have never played GTA in my life so was a little apprehensive that not knowing the game might impact on my enjoyment. It didn't at all, indeed that proved quite a fun template for their scenario as the mix of characters they encountered showed quite clearly that these men were not the only ones adrift in a closed-down world. As you'd expect, it is a quickly paced affair and I thought well worth and hour and a half.

tender_buttkiss

Written on 12/1/2025

A weird little time capsule movie for a weird time in history, when a global pandemic forced us into lockdown and for some, this became an opportunity to create. Going into this, I thought I'd be seeing something much more different than the end product, and I couldn't help but feel a bit let down with the actual performance of the play. Felt like it was jumping around and just showing the highlights. Maybe that's for the best. But it is an interesting and ambitious idea, trying go crowd source a Shakespeare production with people playing characters in a digital world. Genuinely teared up at bits too.

Media

Video essay: “Infinite Jesters: Protest and Performance in a Simulated World”

Video essay: “Infinite Jesters: Protest and Performance in a Simulated World”

In Conversation with Pinny Grylls and Sam Crane

In Conversation with Pinny Grylls and Sam Crane

Official US Trailer

Official US Trailer

Grand Theft Hamlet directors on the challenge of staging Shakespeare in Grand Theft Auto Online

Grand Theft Hamlet directors on the challenge of staging Shakespeare in Grand Theft Auto Online

UK theatrical trailer

UK theatrical trailer