Adele delights fans as she pays homage to Hamlet’s Ophelia in ‘I Drink Wine’ video

Fans praised ‘beautiful’ visuals of new video

Adele has delighted fans by paying homage to a famous painting in the music video for her latest single.

On Wednesday (26 October), the singer released the video for her latest single “I Drink Wine”.

In it, Adele is shown floating down a river in an inflatable with a glass of wine in her hand, gliding past construction workers and men fishing while surrounded by synchronised swimmers.

Towards the end of the song, the camera pulls back, showing that the entire scene has taken place in a studio lot, with the sunset background really an animated screen.

In the last scene, she lies in the water surrounded by peonies in a gold sequin dress.

On Twitter, Adele thanked director Joe Talbot, writing: “Thank you Joe Talbot for creating a world for it and for putting the most incredible bunch of creatives together, you’re so talented and I’m honoured to have worked with you all!”

Adele’s fans called the video a “masterpiece”, with one writing: “Wow, what a legendary voice.  The song is soothing and powerful, calm and strong. The visuals give a nostalgic feel combined with looking forward to the future and also being in the present moment. It is art.”

A number of social media users compared the visuals to John Everett Millais’ famous painting of Ophelia from Hamlet floating in the water, surrounded by flowers.

“I know Adele was inspired by Ophelia for the video of ‘I Drink Wine’, which I love enormously by the way, but I can’t unsee it,” another wrote.

“Adele perfectly recreated Ophelia,” one tweet read.

“Babe, everything is amazing and beautiful!! We love you so much!” one commenter wrote.

Another tweet read: “‘I Drink Wine’ was such a beautiful music video. Every single part of it. I’ve grown such a love for Adele with this album. Wow wow wow.”

Ahead of the video’s release, Adele took part in a fan event called Happy Hour with Adele.

During the event, she said that she thought Taylor Swift was “one of the greatest songwriters of our generation”, adding that she’d loved her last two albums.