The RSC Macbeth: Final Review
Over the past week I've had the privilege of watching five performances of Macbeth at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Straford-upon-Avon. As soon as The RSC announced it as part of their summer season, I knew I’d have to be there. I don’t regret it in the slightest.
The first time you watch a show, you’re very much focused on the plot and the general events happening on the stage. Even when you’re a person who always notices the details (hi), there’s a lot happening onstage, and it usually doesn’t leave enough available mental resources to remember the small things later on. Watching the play several times allowed me to take everything into account.
This production uses young girls as the witches, which immediately stands out in the play. The girls are incredibly creepy - and the creepiness effect doesn’t lessen in time. There’s something dark and sinister about their behaviour and the baby dolls they carry around with them. It’s enough to see them playing with the dolls or rocking them in their arms, like mothers putting their babies to sleep, to run shivers down one’s spine.
The motherhood theme is particularly present in this play. According to Niamh Cusack, playing Lady Macbeth, the idea of Lady Macbeth being unable to have children came up early in the development of this production, and it was embraced by both Christopher [Eccleston, Macbeth] and Polly [Findlay, director]. In a time when a woman’s main job was to produce children, the fact Lady Macbeth cannot have children (apart from one, who died a baby) makes her look for something else to give her husband. That’s where kingship comes in.
You can see how it affect Lady Macbeth - and Macbeth himself - throughout the production. The very talk of children is difficult for them both. It’s one of the things that show these characters as human - and pained ones, at that. Lady Macbeth’s own conscience only begins to drive her to madness once she hears a recording of Macduff’s child being killed. It’s also Macbeth’s mention that she should only have male children that causes her to break down early in the play, and the way Christopher and Niamh hold each other in that moment makes your heart ache. The deep love between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is very clear, particularly in that moment.
Some of the reviews I read today mentioned the lack of reference to dictatorship, which is very present in our world at the moment. But looking at the production, it’s easy to tell it’s just not true. The beauty of this production is in the sense of insecurity Christopher brings to Macbeth. His Macbeth gives a glimpse into the mind of a dictator. More often than not, the ones who seem most ruthless and secure are in fact the most insecure of all, and their ruthlessness is nothing but a way to hide it, to prove to themselves they’re not anything less than others. Christopher’s Macbeth is very much that, from his self-doubt over killing the king, to the constant visions he’s seeing.
Some of my favourite moments of this production are actually around that insecurity in Macbeth and the love between him and Lady Macbeth. The way they hold each other, the way they manage to reach each other, and even the grief in Macbeth after Lady Macbeth dies - all show that this is very much a tale of a couple, of equals, rather than Macbeth and his wife.
Like I said, Macbeth’s insecurity is very clear in this production. His sudden doubts about going along with Lady Macbeth’s plan, as well as the way he talks about killing Banquo, show his conscience (”he is too full of the milk of human kindness,” says Lady Macbeth in the beginning, and she’s right). His admission to Lady Macbeth that “my mind is full of scorpions” and that whole bedroom scene, where Macbeth keeps going from grief and doubt to certainty and back again, make it easy to feel for Macbeth. Macbeth seems ruthless in several scenes, but the moments he talks to the audience (brilliant move, by the way) or to Lady Macbeth show just how little he is certain of. There are a great desperation and a great pain in him.
As always, Christopher’s performance is captivating. Macbeth’s dagger soliloquy makes you search for the dagger onstage. His pain and doubt bring tears to your eyes. The vulnerability he brings to Macbeth is heartbreaking. Even the mockery in Macbeth’s tone and words in certain moments make you want to join in, because of course the other person is being ridiculous, of course Macbeth is right. That’s just the way it feels. Especially when he’s alone onstage, talking to the audience, rather than to himself. He invites you in, and you very easily and very willingly come in.
The subtle changes Niamh and Christopher make every night bring different elements into the spotlight. One night it’s the ferocity and anger in the Macbeths; the next it’s the vulnerability in them. They play around the script with the actions they take, and it’s absolutely beautiful to see. In the end of the day, though, what you think about when you walk out every night is how easy it is to use someone’s pain and insecurity against them, and how vulnerable to corruption one is when filled with those emotions. THIS is how dictators begin.
Michael Hodgson’s Porter is another beautiful part of this production. The Porter is very much an important part of the production, and while he certainly gives the occasional comic break, his role is far bigger than that. In a way, the Porter is “the porter of hell” here, and the way Michael plays him, he’s a fairly dark character, although not without humour. The Porter being onstage throughout the whole play and the “death count” he keeps on the walls make him a central character, even if it doesn’t have as many lines as other main characters.
The clock was an interesting addition, though I will admit it had me a bit distracted the first time around. It does add a certain sense of urgency, and the similarity between the ending of the production and the beginning of it, with the witches, as well as restarting the clock, hint at the cycle of death continuing. The way I saw it, it’s an interesting reminder that mankind just doesn’t learn - and history keeps repeating itself as the cycles go on and on. The most obvious example to that would be Hitler and Trump... but we won’t go there right now.
Overall, an absolutely brilliant production. I’m incredibly happy that I got the chance to watch it multiple times, and I certainly hope I’ll get to watch it again onstage, either at the RST or at the Barbican. It’s worth it.
There are post-show-reviews for four of the five shows I watched here and there’s a bit about meeting Christopher Eccleston at the stage door here, in case anyone cares. I’ll just say he was really kind and sweet <3
