Oh, that his too, too solid fanbase would melt, thaw and resolve itself into a dew, maybe some normal people would have a chance to see Benedict Cumberbatch play Hamlet.
Cumberbatch’s 12-week run as Hamlet on a London stage is nearly a year away, but it sold out in mere minutes, a feat The London Evening Standard is calling the city’s fastest-selling theater ticket in history.
The star of Sherlock and Star Trek Into Darkness will play the brooding Danish prince from Aug. 5 to Oct 31, 2015 at the Barbican Theatre. With nearly 2,000 seats, it’s Europe’s largest mixed-use performing arts center.
Roughly 100,000 tickets went on sale Tuesday morning, and were gone with in minutes; by afternoon, the queue for the first ticket available (yeah, like that’s going to happen) had exceeded 30,000.
Viagogo, a sort of Ticketmaster Europe that started in 2006, told the Standard that the production was its most searched-for event in its history. The newspaper reported that tickets were already being offered for resale at prices exceeding $700.
Alas, poor Cumberb*tches. We hardly knew ye.