"Hamnet," the story behind William Shakespeare's Hamlet now out in theatres

NEW YORK (WABC) -- The story behind Williams Shakespeare's masterpiece, "Hamlet" is now out in theatres, starring Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal called "Hamnet."

The movie is based on real life events, but tells the fictional tale of Shakespeare and the people he loved most in life.

Eyewitness News entertainment reporter Joelle Garguilo spoke with the cast.

For centuries, historians have dug into Shakespeare's past, but some stories live between the lines.

Hamnet imagines what they couldn't find, the story of William Shakespeare and his wife Agnes, grieving the loss of their only son, a loss that may have inspired one of the greatest tragedies ever written.

Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley bring the couple to life.

Joelle Garguilo: This movie is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, so I needed to talk to you. This is a stunning film. So congratulations. All of it is beyond deserved.

Both: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Garguilo: I know that you guys were saying that this is a work of an inspired imagine. There's so little we truly actually really know about these two, especially Agnes. So if we could just pretend for a second, what questions do you have for Agnes? What questions do you have for William Shakespeare?

Paul Mescal: My first gut response, and I think it would be to both of them, it would be thank you. It would be thank you because I think the film discusses not the fact that like Will went off and that he needed Agnes to tell tell him to go and do it. And I think that that to me, we don't know if any of that is remotely true, but to me, it feels I don't know what I'm sure I would have a thousand questions, but the first thing that jumps to my mind is I thank them both.

Buckley: I think I'd like to just sit down and take her hand Yeah. And, like, touch the part of her hand that she touches with other people. And I don't think I'd like to say anything to her. I think I just do that and just, like, I don't know.

Mescal: Sit and watch them. Just Just see see how they are. So then we come back with actual fact of it.

Buckley: At that, I'd be like, should we go for a walk in the woods? Yeah. That's what I'd like.

Garguilo: I I kept thinking about this this one line, of course, to be or not to be are the most famous line, I think, ever. Right? Do you approach that line in a different way than you do with the others? Like, what are you feeling on the day when you know, okay, I have to deliver?

Mescal: Like pressurized day for sure, but not because of the line itself, but because of what he was what the film is telling us that he's communicating there. He's not writing to be or not to be and going. That's a great line. He's going, oh, this is a question about, like, how do I survive this grief? That is the reason to me why the line has been discussed for centuries is because it's coming from a point of somebody standing at the edge of a river and being like, maybe I can't be here anymore. And I think that that the pressure was to do with the context not the delivery of the line.

Garguilo: What do you love about Agnes? I feel like I didn't really know that much about her.

Buckley: I just love her soul, you know? I love her tenderness. I love how she is uncompromising about her body and mind, how she moves through the world. I love how she loves and how she has the ability to, like, listen and see people, you know, and sit in sit in places. I have been absolutely changed by her.