Macbeth – Harold Pinter Theatre – Saturday 30th November 2024

(Rated 5/5) Of all of Shakespeare’s best-known plays, ‘The Scottish Play’ is my least favourite, though, ironically, I realise I have seen it a few times and I know Lady M’s sleepwalking soliloquy off by heart, and hold it in my heart too. So, why did I go yet again?! I mean, of course, Mr. David Tennant is always a draw for me – I have never seen him be ‘rubbish’! But that alone was not enough, and I only half-heartedly tried to get tickets at the Donmar, and didn’t feel that disappointed that I didn’t succeed. But, when the opportunity arose again, and my sister-from-another-mister together with her blood sister wanted to go, I gave my attempts at ticket-acquiring more energy and got row B stalls, before it all sold out very rapidly. I joked with my SFAM that the three of could be his three witches. And, as it turned out maybe so, as they were not physically present! Before I go on, there will be spoilers in this review. Not of the play and plot itself really, but of the production, because, in a way, it all needs saying to try to convey the impact of the ways the audience experienced it.

Once in your seat, you’re invited to put on headphones and test to make sure you hear sounds in the correct ears – very important for later – and yes, you literally cannot hear the performances properly without them. I later met up with my ‘Three Boys’ and A commented it was 8D sound – actually yes – noises of all varieties come at you from all directions, and in some cases it’s pretty crucial to be able to identify from whence they emanate 😉 Macbeth opens with the ‘Weird Sisters’ – no, not me, my SFAM and her sister lol – voiced by the ensemble directly into our ears, as though coming from everywhere and internally at one and the same time. Together with the smoke and candle-lighting you immediately feel like you’re in an other ethereal world, and that together with a minimal black set and a simple glass box at the back trapping at different points many of the cast, who are all – besides one – dressed in dark colours, provides a powerful sense of the sinister and feeling that you’re deep into the darkness of the psychology of this play. Being so immersed, and with tremendous performances hitting me, I genuinely felt more connected with this Macbeth than any other. When Shakespeare is performed with such perfect awareness of the meaning and skill at expressing the emotion of it by the actors, the audience cannot fail to ‘receive it’. David Tennant is certainly a master of the bard. He, and Cush Jumbo as Lady Macbeth, had me so fully engaged. And there is an interesting ‘twist’ in this particular production – He is all in black, She is all in white – unusually and unexpectedly, she is the light to his dark. David’s Macbeth put me in mind of him playing cold psychopath Dennis Nilsen in ‘Des’, and the pace of his delivery and character development too, reminded me of the way he gave us the fast-thinking 10th Doctor becoming all too power-obsessed in the ’Doctor Who’ episode ‘The Waters of Mars’. As many will know, it is normally Lady M, who encourages and even manipulates the couple’s dastardly deeds, but here she is the humanity and conscience to his apparent total lack of guilt. That said the headphones add to the intimacy of the turmoil of their interactions – he can whisper into her and we hear every little murmur. We feel trapped in the game of crowns too, which has to be played by adults and children alike. The presence and absence of children is very keenly felt in this – and again Lady Cush Macbeth poignantly conveys her lack and pain at never being a mother. It also put me in mind of the Tudor World of Hilary Mantel’s ‘Wolf Hall’ and the story of Richard III’s nephews ‘The Princes in the Tower’ and the unsolved potential crime; were they murdered? – both very present on our TVs just at the moment. We’d hope we had become less barbaric, but tragically innocents and children are dying even today in places around the world, simply because of politics! Have we not learned??!! Yet, this is of course exactly what good theatre does for us – it’s past, it’s present, it’s future, it’s showing us ourselves in all our glory and utter tragic insanity.

Just as the darkness and devastation may be getting too much, Jatinder Singh Randhawa distracts us away from the stage by appearing to our right in one of the boxes and teases us about wearing headphones, ‘Are you expecting a radio play?’, argues with an usher who is supposedly trying to throw him out and get him to buy a very expensive programme, and then gives us a stand-up show! At first, I found this very contemporary sketch – mentioning the likes of Suella Braverman and Trump – out of place and distracting, but it later occurred to me this is actually a History play even though it wasn’t called one, and with kings in it, it also needs a fool. Jatinder was a superb fool and made me smile so much. ‘Knock, Knock…’ And after such not entirely frivolous jollity we are back to knocking at the gates of the court of Macbeth! The ensemble cast are like trapped shadow-figures at many points, yet also very front and actively present at others. Standing out for me was Rona Morrison as Lady Macduff – aside from excellent acting she also had excellent red hair! 😉 As also did Gemma Laurie as Ross – we noticed she got extra applause from the cast, then realising she was the cover for usual Ross – an impressive cover 😊

I had a strange experience of time in this production. Even though in many ways it was obvious where we were in the play, I felt Lady M’s presence much longer than I have in other productions. It’s like she was very much there even when she physically wasn’t. I guess that was in part the power of the character’s influence, but also a little like the witches, she could be present in spirit and not in body. The ghosts of other characters continually haunted Macbeth also as the actor playing them was always present even if their character was absent. This, I’ve only just fully engaged with as I write about it now. Clever choice and effect! Our headphones delivered a great deal more than simply actors’ voices, together with wildlife and witchcraft, there was music… and also, we had dancing worthy of places on Strictly! Very enjoyable to watch 😊

As I mentioned earlier, I talked with my ‘Three Boys’ about this production afterwards and A said he had to learn and deliver one of the soliloquys. I started ‘Is this a dagger…’ He said ‘No, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Tomorrow…’ I asked him why. Apparently, because it was the shortest 😉 I’d witnessed David Tennant joking with Greg Doran about that speech, yet in performing it, of course, David was ever the professional and we felt Macbeth’s utter brokenness and devastation at the loss of his Lady wife.

This production has given me whole new insights into and appreciation of The Scottish Play. Thank you, David, Cush, Will, Director Max Webster and the whole cast and crew!! Macbeth – Review by TheRestrictedReviewer © 2024