MACBETH

by William Shakespeare
Performed by Heartbreak Productions
Williamson Park, Lancaster
Thursday 12 August 2004

Reviewed by Michael Nunn

Dark, dank deeds, and powerful psycho-drama

Good choice
My first reaction to the notion of doing Macbeth as part of a summer season in the open air was that it was an odd choice for a warm, sultry evening. If you think about it, though, there is no reason why not – late Elizabethan and early Jacobean theatre was mostly staged outside in all weathers, and the appearance of a tragedy in this mini-season was in fact a welcome foil to the predominantly comedic theme of the run.

Heartbreak Productions takes Shakespeare's bare text, impose judicious cuts, and mount their production with a cleverly-doubled cast of seven. This formula, whilst sounding cheese-paring, actually works well, and distils the essentials of the drama into a powerful and intimate experience.

Psychological drama
Instead of focussing on the gore and butchery of the rival clan or gang warfare as the Polanski film does, Peter Mimmack's edition and production concentrate on the psychological turmoil of the drama, and use the limited resources to strong dramatic effect. Here, among the striking representations of the all-pervading atmosphere of evil, was a Lady Macbeth who simply lost the plot to her sanity, whilst her husband, the hero of the piece, drank his way round and further into the problem.

Appropriately, and to balance Macbeth's alcoholic degeneration, the Porter's scene was – uniquely to my knowledge – played sober, and by a destiny-like figure who kept a sinister watchful presence during most of the action. The supernatural forces were also ingeniously played, with one three-headed monster whose three different voices showed the Three Witches as a unity akin, to the mysteries of the Trinity.

On another level, the battle scenes were well depicted by the use of sound, mime and tableau, and the intriguing, multi-layered set adapted itself well to "An open place,' the blasted heath, "Somewhere in England,' a house and a park, as well as to sundry rooms in the castles/ palaces/ gang bunkers at Forres, Inverness, Fife and, ultimately, Dunsinane.

Powerful impact
The persistent rain which accompanied most of last Thursday night's performance made an unusually significant contribution to the dour, dreich atmosphere of the drama. The audience, enveloped in Heartbreak's powerful production of the bloody action was not deterred one whit, and stayed the course, drawn on by a performance which compellingly forged its inexorable way forward through the psychological and physical warfare to its bloody climax.

Copyright © 17 August 2004
Michael Nunn; John L Burkinshaw (photos: Banquo's Ghost, Birnham Wood)

Dreich (pr ‘dreech'): long-lasting, persistent; hard to bear; bleak (The Concise Scots Dictionary, 1985, Aberdeen University Press)

For some useful links on the encyclopaedic BBC's website to the historical background to Macbeth and Scotland in the 11th Century, see:

www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/macbeth.shtml.
www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/scotland/macbeth.shtml
www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/britain/inv_macbeth.shtml