TEHRAN – Arasbaran Cultural Center in Tehran is hosting the play “The Little Prince of Denmark” written by Swedish playwright Torsten Letser and translated into Persian by Nasser Hosseini-Mehr. 

The 55-minute play is an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”, which narrates the story of the Danish prince for children and young adults, Mehr reported.

Although the play has a different storyline from Shakespeare’s work, all the characters of the original “Hamlet” appear in the play, along with a clown and a guard who have been added to the story.

The play narrates the story of an eight-year-old Danish prince, Hamlet, who uncovers a plot for his father’s murder. With his friend Ophelia, he acts out the scenario with dolls – the actors' scene. Uncle Claudius finds this amusing, but he orders two swords because boys don't play with dolls. Hamlet wants to warn his father, but the father, freshly returned from the war, refuses to listen to the boy's fantasies. However, he has brought his son a bear from his travels. And with the bear's help, the murder is ultimately prevented.

In this parallel “Hamlet”, Letser not only plays with the characters and plot of Shakespeare's tragedy, but also blends the loose, five-beat blank verse of adults with the children's concise, everyday prose sentences.

For children, the playful reference to Shakespeare is neither a problem nor a central theme; for adults, however, it's a delight that delves right into the heart of the matter – but from the children's perspective.

Navid Mohebbi, Amir-Abbas Saleh, Amir-Ali Zamannejad, Majid Zarezadeh, Mohammad-Ali Mahboubi, Elena Shojai, Amir-Mehdi Alizadeh, Ashkan Gholizadeh, and Ali Ali-Mohammadi are the cast members of the Persian adaptation of “The Little Prince of Denmark”.

The play will remain on stage until January 16, 2026, at the Arasbaran Cultural Center, located on Jolfa Street, northwest of Seyed-Khandan Bridge.

SS/SAB