Shakespearean Actor Brian Cox Teaches Hamlet’s Soliloquy to a 2‑Year-Old Child

Per­haps you’ve seen Scot­tish actor Bri­an Cox in block­buster films like Brave­heart, The Bourne Iden­ti­ty, or Troy. Or, if you’re lucky enough, you’ve seen him per­form with the Roy­al Shake­speare Com­pa­ny in crit­i­cal­ly-acclaimed per­for­mances of The Tam­ing of The Shrew and Titus Andron­i­cus. But there’s per­haps anoth­er role you haven’t seen him in: tutor of tod­dlers. Sev­er­al years back, Cox taught Theo, then only 30 months old, the famous solil­o­quy from Ham­let, hop­ing to show there’s a Shake­speare­an actor in all of us. Lat­er, Cox talked to the BBC about his “mas­ter­class” with Theo and what he took away from the expe­ri­ence. Watch him muse right below:

Relat­ed Con­tent:

What Shake­speare Sound­ed Like to Shake­speare: Recon­struct­ing the Bard’s Orig­i­nal Pro­nun­ci­a­tion

Orson Welles’ Radio Per­for­mances of 10 Shake­speare Plays

Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour Sings Shakespeare’s Son­net 18

Free Online Shake­speare Cours­es: Primers on the Bard from Oxford, Har­vard, Berke­ley & More


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Comments (3)
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  • Michael Brown says:

    Thank you. I real­ly enjoyed that and who would have ever thought of teach­ing a 2 yr. old Shake­speare?

  • Sharon Dempster says:

    That was fan­tas­tic a bril­liant stu­dent! A 2 yr old Shake­speare­an nii­i­ice!

  • Jim Ruddle says:

    When my old­est daugh­ter was about the same age I astound­ed some guests as the tot stood on a cof­fee table, ges­tur­ing as she spoke, and recit­ed the “Tomor­row, and tomor­row, and tomor­row creeps in this pet­ty pace from day to day…” solil­o­quy from Mac­beth. I admit that “to the last syl­la­ble of record­ed time” came out as “sib­bibul”, but what the hell.

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