Stupid question about Hamlet

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.

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

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.

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!'"

Fascinating. You might wish to post this issue on:

Shakespeare Forums - Hamlet

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.

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.