Hamlet Gets A Vegan Makeover
Forget everything you think you know about Hamlet. Hotter Project’s HAM takes Shakespeare’s familiar tragedy, throws it into the middle of the climate crisis and adds veganism, animal rights, sexual shame, audience participation and a frankly bewildering amount of theatrical chaos.
Created and performed by Mary Higgins and Ell Potter, this is Shakespeare with the safety catch removed. Here, Hamlet’s grief is centred not on the death of his father, but on the death of a pig. His search for revenge becomes an increasingly absurd battle over meat, morality and the choices we make every day.
Higgins gives us a wonderfully volatile Hamlet, moving effortlessly between righteous fury, vulnerability and complete theatrical meltdown. Potter is equally compelling, switching between characters with a comic confidence that keeps the production moving at a frantic pace. Their chemistry is one of the show’s biggest strengths: the two performers constantly bounce off one another, turning serious arguments about climate, consumption and responsibility into moments of genuine comedy.
The production cleverly uses Shakespeare’s language as a starting point rather than a rulebook. Familiar speeches are twisted, interrupted and pulled apart, allowing the audience to look at some of the Bard’s most famous ideas from a completely different perspective. The result is playful without losing sight of the much bigger questions underneath.
And HAM certainly isn’t afraid to make its audience uncomfortable. Video footage depicting animal slaughter and environmental destruction sits alongside the comedy, creating a deliberately jarring contrast. One minute you’re laughing at an outrageous piece of physical theatre; the next, you’re confronted with images of the consequences of human consumption.
That tonal collision is precisely what makes the show work. There is plenty of silliness, including wonderfully strange movement sequences, audience interaction and moments that are almost impossible to describe without sounding ridiculous, but the humour never completely lets us escape the issues being raised.
What could easily have become a heavy-handed lecture instead feels more like an unruly conversation. Higgins and Potter don’t simply tell the audience what to think; they drag us into the argument and leave us to wrestle with the uncomfortable bits ourselves.
Bold, filthy, funny and surprisingly thought-provoking, HAM is a Fringe show that knows exactly how to turn an old story into something thoroughly contemporary. You may laugh, you may squirm, and you may leave questioning what’s actually on your plate.
Either way, it’s unlikely you’ll look at Hamlet – or ham – quite the same way again.Summerhall Arts, Old Lab, Edinburgh
6–30 August 2026 (not 18 or 25 August)
7:30pm
60 minutes
18+
Hotter Project, Speakerphone Productions & Soho Theatre
Strong language, nudity, sexual content, violence, strobe lighting, audience participation and potentially distressing themes.