Last performed in 2003
Smart Guide
| Program
|
Photo Gallery
Synopsis
After performing brave exploits in the service of King Duncan, the victorious Scottish generals Macbeth and Banquo meet three witches on a barren heath. They hail the men with chilling prophecies in riddle form: now Thane of Glamis, Macbeth shall be Thane of Cawdor and finally king; Banquo shall be father to kings though never king himself. Hearing of the prophecies and their uncanny partial fulfillment, Lady Macbeth resolves to break down her husband's resistance to evil. She at last urges him to act on their mutual ambitions by murdering King Duncan while he is a guest in their castle.
Plagued by conscience and fear of judgment, Macbeth nonetheless commits the murder and also kills Duncan's grooms, accusing them of the bloody deed. Duncan's sons, fearing for their own lives, decide to flee. Thus Macbeth becomes king.
Resenting the witches' prophecy that Banquo's offspring will be kings, Macbeth has Banquo murdered, but his son Fleance escapes. After Banquo's ghost appears at a state banquet, Macbeth, tortured by guilt and virtually mentally deranged, returns to the witches for solace.
With riddling prophecies and a show of apparitions, the witches deliver to him both promises and warnings. Ignorant of the equivocal nature of their words, Macbeth is convinced that hereafter his hand may freely perform what his mind purposes, however black the deed may be. Thus he hires the murder of Macduff's wife and all his children while the noble thane Macduff is in England, where he goes to persuade the exiled Malcolm to join forces with him against Macbeth. The guilt-ridden Lady Macbeth sleepwalks and finally commits suicide.
One by one the witches' prophecies become ominously true as Scottish and English forces attack Macbeth's castle. Macduff at last slays Macbeth, and Malcolm is crowned king of Scotland.
The Universe of Macbeth
Macbeth is a play about temptation, crime, and punishment. In dramatizing the fall of a human hero, Shakespeare explores the struggle between good and evil in the individual soul, the kingdom of Scotland, and the universe at large.
For Shakespeare's original audiences, perhaps the most engaging element of Macbeth was its incorporation of the supernatural in the witches and apparitions, the imaginary dagger that beckons Macbeth to murder, and the ghost of Banquo. These elements represent that realm of unknown evil that Shakespeare's audience had been taught to shun. The witches are obviously closely associated with demonism. Their foul, ugly ritualism and the hideous ingredients of their cauldron suggest unrestrained evil. At the same time, they reflect Macbeth's own black thoughts. Certainly they are an effective artistic illustration of the danger of any sort of involvement, physical or otherwise, with the ministers of Satan.
When Macbeth and Lady Macbeth choose to cast their lots with the agents of evil, they ironically forfeit freedom of will and ultimately even their own humanity. Invoking darkness to hide their evil deeds, they become themselves the prey of the powers of darkness.
For Macbeth, initially hesitant to act because he sees the horrible consequences of murdering Duncan, evil action becomes compulsive. On the other hand, Lady Macbeth, who approaches the murder unimaginatively as mere business to be carried out, is haunted by her own imaginative memories of the crime. For both, temporal gains become, paradoxically, losses. In giving up moral law, they forfeit that which gives meaning to life. In the end, Lady Macbeth cannot bear to go on living with her guilt; and Macbeth, a prisoner in the dungeon of his own mind, sees life as empty and meaningless before he is himself savagely slaughtered.
Why do "this dead butcher and his fiendlike queen" hold such a fascination for audiences? Is it simply because we are intrigued by the dark side of life? Perhaps instead, it is Macbeth's eloquence and rich imagination that continue to engage our moral sensibilities even after the hero has turned villain. He sees evil for what it is: powerful, brutal, futile, and damning. Macbeth's insights into life and afterlife are ultimately forceful, persuasive arguments for choosing good rather than evil.
Janie McCauley