Adapted from Maggie O’Farrell’s award-winning novel, Hamnet brings Shakespeare’s family tragedy and its echoes in Hamlet to the screen through Chloé Zhao’s lens. Starring Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal, the film captures the silence created by loss and the solace found in art.
William Shakespeare’s son Hamnet, who died at the age of 11, has long been remembered only as a footnote in history. Yet this loss resonates at the heart of one of literature’s most profound texts, Hamlet. With her 2020 novel Hamnet, Maggie O’Farrell brought this forgotten story to light, giving a voice to Shakespeare’s wife, Agnes, who history books often render silent. The novel explores a mother’s grief, the disintegration and eventual reconnection of a family, and how loss transforms art, revealing the fragile human story behind the Shakespearean myth.
Reaching over two million readers worldwide and earning multiple accolades, including the Women’s Prize for Fiction, O’Farrell’s novel now finds new life in Chloé Zhao’s cinematic vision. Zhao, who made Oscar history with Nomadland, once again focuses on loss, silence, and the invisible lives around us. Hamnet examines not only the grief of a child’s death but also how this sorrow nourished Shakespeare’s creative genius.
From Page to Screen: Zhao’s Vision of Hamnet
A key moment in the trailer captures a dialogue between William Shakespeare and Agnes, distilling the film’s emotional core: “Tell me a story,” Agnes says. “What do you want me to tell?” Shakespeare replies. “Something that shakes me.” This brief exchange reflects the shared emotional essence of O’Farrell’s novel and Zhao’s adaptation: being shaken, confronting loss, and finding solace in art.
In the film, Paul Mescal portrays the young Shakespeare, while Jessie Buckley embodies Agnes at the center of the story. Emily Watson, Joe Alwyn, and Jacobi Jupe round out the cast, bringing to life the silence of grief and the fractures within the Shakespeare household. Produced by Steven Spielberg, Sam Mendes, and Pippa Harris, the film will have a limited release on November 27, followed by a worldwide rollout starting December 12.
