In the spring of 1813, Foersom himself brought out Hamlet on the Danish stage. Nearly sixty years were to pass before this play was put on in Norway, March 4, 1870.
The press was not lavish in its praise. Dagbladet[III.18] remarks that though the performance was not what it ought to have been, the audience followed it from first to last with undivided attention. Aftenbladet[III.19] has a long and interesting review. Most of it is given over to a criticism of Isaachson's Hamlet. First of all, says the reviewer, Isaachson labors under the delusion that every line is cryptic, embodying a secret. This leads him to forget the volume of the part and to invent all sorts of fanciful interpretations for details. Thus he loses the unity of the character. Things are hurried through to a conclusion and the fine transitions are lost. For example, "Oh, that this too, too solid flesh would melt" is started well, but the speech at once gains in clearness and decision until one wonders at the close why such a Hamlet does not act at once with promptness and vigor. There are, to be sure, occasional excellences, but they do not conceal the fact that, as a whole, Isaachson does not understand Hamlet.
Since its first performance Hamlet has been given often in Norway—twenty-eight times at the old Christiania Theater, and (from October 31, 1907) seventeen times at the new National Theater. Its revival in 1907, after an intermission of twenty-four years, was a complete success, although Morgenbladet[III.20] complained that the performance lacked light and inspiration. The house was full and the audience appreciative.
Aftenposten[III.21] found the production admirable. Christensen's Hamlet was a stroke of genius. "Han er voxet i og med Rollen; han har trængt sig ind i den danske Prins' dybeste Individualitet." And of the revival the paper says: "The performance shows that a national theater can solve difficult problems when the effort is made with sympathy, joy, and devotion to art."
In my judgment no theater could have given a better caste for The Merry Wives of Windsor than that with which Christiania Theater was provided. All the actors were artists of distinction; and it is not strange, therefore, that the first performance was a huge success. Aftenposten[III.22] declares that Brun's Falstaff was a revelation. Morgenbladet[III.23] says that the play was done only moderately well. Brun as Falstaff was, however, "especially amusing." Aftenbladet[III.24] is more generous. "The Merry Wives of Windsor has been awaited with a good deal of interest. Next to the curiosity about the play itself, the chief attraction has been Brun as Falstaff. And though Falstaff as lover gives no such opportunities as Falstaff, the mock hero, Brun makes a notable rôle out of it because he knows how to seize upon and bring out all there is in it."
Johannes Brun's Falstaff is a classic to this day on the Norwegian stage. In Illustreret Tidende for July 12, 1874, K.A. Winterhjelm has a short appreciation of his work. "Johannes Brun has, as nearly as we can estimate, played something like three hundred rôles at Christiania Theater. Many of them, to be sure, are minor parts—but there remains a goodly number of important ones, from the clown in the farce to the chief parts in the great comedies. Merely to enumerate his great successes would carry us far afield. We recall in passing that he has given us Falstaff both in Henry IV and in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Bottom in A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Autolycus in A Winter's Tale. Perhaps he lacks something of the nobleman we feel that he should be in Henry IV, but aside from this petty criticism, what a wondrous comic character Brun has given us!"
As to the success of Coriolanus, the sixteenth of Shakespeare's plays to be put on in Kristiania, neither the newspapers nor the magazines give us any clew. If we may believe a little puff in Aftenposten for January 20, 1874, the staging was to be magnificent. Coriolanus was played in a translation by Hartvig Lassen for the first time on January 21, 1874. After thirteen performances it was withdrawn on January 10, 1876, and has not been since presented.
In 1877, Richard III was brought on the boards for the first time, but apparently the occasion was not considered significant, for there is scarcely a notice of it. The public seemed surfeited with Shakespeare, although the average had been less than one Shakespearean play a season. At all events, it was ten years before the theater put on a new one—Julius Caesar, on March 22, 1888. It had the unheard of distinction of being acted sixteen times in one month, from the premiere night to April 22. Yet the papers passed it by with indifference. Most of them gave it merely a notice, and the promised review in Aftenposten never appeared.
Julius Caesar is the last new play to be presented at Christiania Theater or at the National Theater, which replaced the old Christiania Theater in 1899. From October, 1899 to January, 1913 the National Theater has presented eight Shakespearean plays, but every one of them has been a revival of plays previously presented.
Bergen