Stupid question about Hamlet

[Chester]

So I've been reading Hamlet. Just for fun. (Take that, all you students. Reading just for the sake of reading. Imagine.) And I come across this:

Polonius: That did I, my lord, and was accounted a good actor.
Hamlet: What did you enact?
Polonius: I did enact Julius Caeser. I was killed i' th' Capitol; Brutus killed me.

Is Bill actually referring to his earlier play? Is he having a character in one play make a reference to another one of his own plays?

I find that amusing, if in fact that's the case.

[JBI]

He, I think, is mocking Polonius by comparing him to Caesar.

[Chester]

I wondered about that. I also wondered if there was a hint of foreshadowing going on there with respect to Polonius's own death.

But am I right that WS is referring to his own play? It would be like...I don't know my modern playwrites, let's just say David Mamet, having a character in Glengarry Glen Ross saying that the other night he went to see a performance of American Buffalo. You know? I thought it was amusing.

[Chester]

This from Wikipedia: The section of dialogue I have posted above "may have contained an 'in-joke within Shakespeare's company: Honigmann [a Shakespeare scholar I take it] points out that it is usually assumed that John Heminges acted both the old-man parts, Caesar in the first play and Polonius in the second, and that Richard Burbage acted both Brutus and Hamlet. 'Polonius would then be speaking on the extra-dramatic level in proclaiming his murder in the part of Caesar, since Hamlet (Burbage) will soon be killing him (Heminges) once more in Hamlet.' There does indeed seem to be a kind of private joke here, with Heminges saying to Burbage 'Here we go again!'"

[Gladys]

Fascinating. You might wish to post this issue on:


Shakespeare Forums - Hamlet (shakespeareforums.com/forumdisplay.php?f=33)

[Chester]

Thanks Gladys but one forum at a time is enough for me. I get distracted by all these wonderful conversations, when I really should be working! You're certainly welcome to run with it, if you'd like. Let me know if anybody there sheds any more light on the matter.

[Billie_Bumble]

Friar Laurence has quite a large part in Romeo and Juliet, there is also a Friar Laurence mentioned in Two Gentlemen of Verona. It is only a mention but I wondered if both were the same person. Stephen King does this all the time in his books.