text: Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
  As the protagonists of Tom Stoppard's play and film, they are confused by the events of Hamlet and seem unaware of their role in the larger drama.  The play is primarily a comedy, but they often stumble upon deep philosophical truths through their nonsensical ramblings. In the movie, Rosencrantz invents the sandwich, and discovers gravity and volume displacement, among other things. The characters depart from their epiphanies as quickly as they come to them.
  At times, one appears more enlightened than the other—but they trade this enlightenment back and forth throughout the drama. Stoppard also littered his play with jokes that refer to the common thespian tendency to swap Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in the midst of the play because the characters are basically identical.  He does this by making Rosencrantz and Guildenstern unsure of who is who, as well as having the other players (Claudius, Hamlet, Gertrude) refer to them frequently by the wrong names. Because of the play's similarity to Waiting for Godot, Rosencrantz is sometimes compared to Estragon (one of the tramps who wait for Godot), and who shares his dim perception of reality, while Guildenstern parallels Vladimir, who shares his analytical perception.