Full casting has been announced for the 2026 Royal Shakespeare Company touring production of Hamlet.

The tour, which is scheduled to visit Truro, Bradford, Norwich, Nottingham, Blackpool, Newcastle upon Tyne, York, and Canterbury between February 24 and April 25, is based on the 2025 Stratford-upon-Avon production directed by Rupert Goold, which placed the Shakespearean classic on deck of the Titanic. The production has been redirected on tour by Sophie Drake.

The touring production will star Ralph Davis as Hamlet, Rob Alexander-Adams as Voltemand, Richard Cant as Polonius, Kat Collings as Ensemble, Raymond Coulthard as Claudius, Maximus Evans as Marcellus, Ian Hughes as Ghost/Player King, CJ Johnson as Player Queen, Julia Kass as Guildenstern, Poppy Miller as Gertrude, Georgia-Mae Myers as Ophelia, Mark Oosterveen as Cornelius/Priest, Djibril Ramsey as Barnardo, Colin Ryan as Horatio, Jonathan Savage as Ensemble, Jamie Sayers as Rosencrantz, Leo Shak as Francisco, and Benjamin Westerby as Laertes.

Said Goold in a statement, “Hamlet is a play about the inevitability of death—the death of fathers, the death of kings, the mortality facing each and everyone of us, but it is also a play about how to live, what makes a good life and a just one too, however brief our allotted time. Our production is set aboard a ship but one that is soon to founder, going down with all hands. Its inspiration comes from the most famous sinking in history, and just as that icy tragedy came to pass in a little over two and a half hours, our play takes place in real time and for about as long, as much catastrophic thriller as poetic meditation. It’s a production that asks what it means to be human and decisive when time is running out.”

In addition to Goold and Drake, the tour creative team also includes set designer Es Devlin, costume designer Evie Gurney, lighting designer Jack Knowles, composer and sound designer Adam Cork, movement director Hannes Langolf, video designer Akhila Krishnan, fight director Kev McCurdy, and dramaturg Rebecca Latham, with casting by Matthew Dewsbury.

The tour of Hamlet is supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England, which makes it possible for the RSC to expand its tour to work in partnership with more places across England. 

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