Thom Yorke Adapts Radiohead’s Hail to the Thief for Hamlet

Next spring, Thom Yorke will bring a unique twist to Hamlet by combining it with Radiohead’s 2003 album, Hail to the Thief.

This new version, called Hamlet Hail to the Thief, blends Shakespeare’s words with reimagined music from the album. Directed by Steven Hoggett and Christine Jones, with arrangements by Justin Levine, this production will feature 20 musicians and actors performing together. The story is set in a creepy Elsinore where everyone is being watched, and Prince Hamlet and Ophelia are caught in a web of fear and corruption.

“This is an interesting and intimidating challenge!” said Yorke about the project. “Adapting the original music of Hail to The Thief for live performance with the actors on stage to tell this story that is forever being told, using its familiarity and sounds, pulling them into and out of context, seeing what chimes with the underlying grief and paranoia of Hamlet, using the music as a ‘presence’ in the room, watching how it collides with the action and the text. Ghosting one against the other.”

The first time Christine Jones saw Radiohead live was during their 2003 tour for Hail to The Thief. She said it changed her DNA. Later on, she connected some themes from both Hamlet’s story and Radiohead’s songs while reading Hamlet again.

The first Radiohead concert I ever saw was the Hail to The Thief tour in 2003. It changed my DNA. Not long after, I was reading Hamlet and listening to the album. Paying attention to lyrics made me aware that many songs from Hail To The Thief speak directly to themes within Hamlet’s play. There are uncanny reverberances between text & album; for years I’ve wanted them colliding on stage; eventually shared idea w/Thom who felt intrigued—wasn’t sure what we’d make but knew wanted Steven involved & continue experimenting/building work done together over years.

The play haunts album & vice versa—both show internal disquiet/rage born from despair scrutinizing power structures—in govs., communities or families; text/music relentlessly probe us: What are we made of? How discern right/wrong?