Alexander Is a Prince of a Guy : Stage: The actor will again star locally as ‘Hamlet,’ this time at the Waltmar Theatre in Orange beginning tonight.

It is the Everest of acting.

The great ones have scaled its heights--Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud, Richard Burton, Derek Jacobi to name a few.

Even the less-great ones--Aidan Quinn and, most recently on film, Mel Gibson--have measured themselves against it.

But once was not enough for Wayne Alexander. He is starring as Hamlet for the second time in nearly a decade and, not coincidentally, in only the second professional production of “Hamlet” that Orange County will have seen in a century.

“Unless you’re a prodigy, the first time you play the role you don’t have a clue,” the actor says. “It’s daunting. The curious thing is that once you’ve played it--and I’m willing to bet this is true for any actor who has--it never leaves you.”

On this occasion, Alexander will portray the famous Prince of Denmark at the Waltmar Theatre on the Chapman University campus, where “Hamlet” opens tonight at 8 under Thomas F. Bradac’s direction. The production, being offered by the recently formed classical troupe Shakespeare Orange County, co-stars Elizabeth Norment as Gertrude, Melanie van Betten as Ophelia, Carl Reggiardo as Claudius, Daniel Bryan Cartmell as Polonius and Michael Nearing as Horatio.

Alexander first played the role in 1984 at the Grove Shakespeare Festival in Garden Grove under the direction of Kristoffer Tabori. Local historian Jim Sleeper can find no other record of “Hamlet,” Shakespeare’s most popular play, being done here by a professional company at least since the county was formed in 1889.

Alexander said a second crack at Hamlet has made a huge difference in his perception of the role, enabling him to probe the emotional complexity of a man bent on avenging his father’s murder. The first time, he said, he was still dealing with surface mechanics.

“There’s so much to learn just in terms of the lines, let alone really understanding the depth they’re coming from,” he noted in an interview earlier this week. “At the Grove I was thrown out (on stage) with one preview, which is the way it works. On opening night I only had half the play under my belt in terms of a fundamental understanding of what it was about.”

He said he now has an entire “back story for Hamlet that clarifies the character, not so much as a melancholy procrastinator trying to make up his mind about how best to seek revenge, but as a passionate man of action weighing the consequences of his vengeance.

“It’s a much more emotional performance this time, particularly from the point of view of what Hamlet has to give up to pursue his revenge. At the Grove, for example, the director did not encourage us to explore the love that Hamlet felt for Ophelia. In this production, the Hamlet-Ophelia relationship is much more pervasive. She is what is sacrificed. And it is a great price.”

Alexander (who prefers not to divulge his age except to say he’s “thirtysomething-ish”) has been familiar to theatergoers in the county since 1980 when he made his South Coast Repertory debut as Claudio in “Much Ado About Nothing.” He was seen at SCR earlier this season in “The Philadelphia Story,” playing Tracy Lord’s debonair ex-husband for the final two weeks of the run. Other leads there have been Jack in “The Importance of Being Earnest,” Cleante in “The Imaginary Invalid” and Rodney Bevan in “Boy Meets Girl.”

The lean, sandy-haired actor worked even more often at the Grove during the ‘80s. In addition to Hamlet, he played Romeo in “Romeo and Juliet,” Proteus in “The Two Gentlemen of Verona,” Banquo in “Macbeth,” Sir Andrew Aguecheek in “Twelfth Night” and, last season, Claudio in “Measure for Measure” for part of its run.

After growing up in Hanford, a small farming community about 30 miles south of Fresno, Alexander went to Los Angeles City College and then to the Actors Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco for his dramatic training. Graduating from A.C.T.’s professional school in 1976, he spent two years in the company and returned to Los Angeles to work in television and film.

“But as all things go in L.A.,” he recounted, “those plans went on the back burner, and I did nothing but theater.”

In 1986, having played stage roles at the Mark Taper Forum and other venues in Los Angeles, Alexander went to New York with a production of “The Common Pursuit” that had originated at the Matrix Theatre. It ran off Broadway for 10 months; when it closed, Alexander stayed and got work on Broadway in a revival of “A Streetcar Named Desire.”

“There was a lot about New York that I really liked,” he said. “The neighborhoods. The energy. It’s always hopping. And in terms of theater, it’s very exciting. The audience is a vast cross-section. You meet cab drivers who go to the theater there.”

On the other hand, “you saw a certain snobbery among the acting elite--and not even among the elite--that you don’t get in L.A. All that stuff about ‘I’m a New York actor.’ But the theater talent is no better there.

“If anything, there’s more classical talent in Southern California when it comes to people who can actually speak the text. I mean, they want to do Shakespeare in New York with a New h awk accent. Think of Al Pacino: ‘Now is duh wintuh of owuh discontent.’ What is that?”

Ironically, when Alexander came back to Los Angeles again seeking movie and TV work, all his stage experience was of little help.

“I could get in to see anybody in New York with my theater resume,” he said. “Here, I couldn’t even get into an office to see a movie agent.”

He did manage to land a role in “Spaced Invaders,” a movie released by Touchstone in 1990. He played a nerdy gas station attendant dressed up for Halloween in a Zorro outfit.

Frustrated, he quit acting for a couple of years. “I traveled. I built furniture for my house. Then things started coming my way. And now here I am playing Hamlet again.

“More than any role I’ve ever had,” he added, “this one gives you an incredible feeling. It’s exhilarating.”

“Hamlet” opens tonight at 8 and continues through Aug. 30 at the Waltmar Theatre, 301 E. Palm Ave., Orange. $18-$23. (714) 744-7016.

BACKGROUND

William Shakespeare is believed to have written “The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark” in 1600 or 1601. It has been the Bard’s best known and most frequently produced play down through the centuries, and seems to have been a popular work from the very beginning. On its first publication in 1603, the printer noted: “The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet Prince of Denmarke By William Shake-speare. As it hath beene diverse times acted by his Highnesse servants in the Cittie of London: as also in the two Universities of Cambridge and Oxford, and else-where.”