I love murder mysteries and procedural crime shows, so you’d think that Robert O’Hara’s re-write of “Hamlet” as a serial killer would be just the thing for me. While Robert O’Hara’s adaptation of “Hamlet” at the Mark Taper Forum starts well with the lovely set design and the cinematic opening, things descend quickly into the gutter.

Purists might resist even successful adaptations such as Bella Spewack and Sam Spewack’s “Kiss Me, Kate” (“Taming of the Shrew”) or  Arthur Laurents’ “West Side Story.” “Kiss Me, Kate” had Cole Porter tunes while Leonard Bernstein’s.  I love both musicals. Even remaking a romantic tragedy into a rom-com is fine if it has the wit of the 2022 “Rosaline” in who Romeo had hoped to court before he saw Juliet, helps Romeo and Juliet escape to an uncertain future while finding love.

Director Robert O’Hara’s adaptation doesn’t have the benefit of catchy tunes and the choreography (movement credited to The Company of Hamlet) strives for abstraction, but serves more as a distraction. Matters of sexuality also distract and detract.

The stage features a backdrop where Yee Eun Nam’s projection designs compliment the double stairway which frame the center entry way to the set in Clint Ramos’ set design. In front of the stairway is a ring, not unlike a circus although a circus filled with animals or even without (a la Cirque du Soleil) might have been more entertaining.

When the play opens, the audience witnesses a lustful romp between Hamlet (Patrick Ball) and Ophelia (Coral Peña). She’s a modern girl and quickly fumbles under her long skirts to find her g-string black lace pantie to throw it as an offering to Hamlet. He will quickly go beneath her skirts. Cunnilingus will be simulated and this won’t be the only time that sexual matters will be a distraction.

Hamlet will still meet his father’s ghost (Joe Chrest) and be set upon the course of revenge, but this is a Hollywood Studio set in modern times. Hamlet and Horatio are not a bromance, but a gay romance. So when Hamlet asks gentlemen to swear upon his sword, he’s talking about male anatomy and not a weapon made by blacksmiths.

Much of Polonius and Laertes’ interactions, particularly with Ophelia have been deleted. And that makes it harder to care  for Polonius when he is murdered. Yet the first act does basically follow Shakespeare’s plot. The second act becomes a murder story where Fortinbras (Chrest) is a detective and Hamlet is is labeled both a serial killer and  a character in a Shakespearean tragedy. As director, O’Hara doesn’t handle the tonal shifts well, the lighting transitions (by lighting designer Lap Chi Chu), however, are lovely, if not sometimes bordering on melodramatic.

There are too many ideas here: sexual switches, the movie industry, serial killers and a faked death. The writing and plotting isn’t clever but repetitive like a hammer driving in a nail. The projections work well to suggest changes of scenery, but for the ghostly appearances and some psychological moments, they are too busy. Some scenes are an unintentional fighting match between the actors and the scenery. The actors often lose and that’s a shame. Ball, who portrays Dr. Frank Langdon, a senior resident, on the new HBO Max  series “The Pitt” and Gina Torres, who just ended a run as EMS captain Tommy Vega on Fox’s procedural “9-1-1: Lone Star,” are competent dramatic actors.

While “Hamlet” should leave one thinking about fathers, sons and revenge, this one left me wanting to watch another “Hamlet” and wishing that these actors will get another chance at these roles. We went to see Torres, but wish the actors had been allowed to create their own magic.

“Hamlet” continues at the Mark Taper Forum until July 6. For tickets or more information, visit CenterTheatreGroup.org.