This play puts the spotlight on the motivations of an actor, which are very much the motivations of any member of society but heightened due to the reality that actors need an audience in order to perform and well, grow. Andrew is an actor living in New York who is visited by the ghost of the great English actor, John Barrymore who has come back to haunt Andrew in order to convince him to play the title role in Shakespeare's masterpiece Hamlet.
Andrew is a television actor, and the pun of this is that actors who work in television are stereotypically untrained in the classics and rarely have the voice and movement skills in order to pull of a theatre production let alone attempt to play one of the greatest parts that's ever been made. And the use of Barrymore's ghost to encourage Andrew is a jab at the fact that many aspiring actors base their choice of what parts they want to play on the basis of having seen a many great actors play a particular part. Thus, while playing Hamlet is a worthy aim it can be deduced that Andrew may simply be attempting to play a part because well, he believes it's a right of passage to becoming the ever allusive "great actor" who's remembered forever.
And this is the reality of Andrew's journey. He wants to play the great part, but underneath the yearning to do so is he more so after being known? Which leads to his final predicament, to play Hamlet or accept a television pilot which could potentially bring him fame and earn him a lot of money. Is acting only for the purity of acting? Or is it the need to be great or famous? Is playing Hamlet about that great part, or is it an attempt to win the love of a woman? Are all actors meant to be broke and poor in spirit, or are they allowed to earn a living doing sub-par work? These are some of the many questions this play poses. And while it is all about an actor, this play easily translates to many spheres of life. So then, are we as individuals out for glory, fame, money, pride? What motivates us? That is the question I believe Rudnick is asking us to examine within ourselves.
