Macbeth, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre April 23 – June 27
Shakespeare – something of a king and much of a rogue himself – understood that the world needs rogues, just as it needs kings. It needs the wildness, warmth and virtue of rogues, to balance against the paranoia, greed and violence of kings; just as it needs the strength of kings, to counteract the confusion of rogues.
This year’s season at the Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre opens at April 23 with Macbeth, Shakespeare’s most terrifying portrait of humanity gone sour.
Shakespeare – something of a king and much of a rogue himself – understood that the world needs rogues, just as it needs kings. It needs the wildness, warmth and virtue of rogues, to balance against the paranoia, greed and violence of kings; just as it needs the strength of kings, to counteract the confusion of rogues. This year’s season at the Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre opens at April 23 with Macbeth, Shakespeare’s most terrifying portrait of humanity gone sour.
When three witches tell the general Macbeth that he is destined to occupy the throne of Scotland, he and his wife choose to become the instruments of their fate and to kill the first man to stand in their path, the virtuous King Duncan. But to maintain his position, Macbeth must keep on killing – at first Banquo, his old comrade-in-arms; and later, as the atmosphere of guilt and paranoia thickens, anyone who seems a threat to the tyrant and his fear.
From its first moments to the last fulfilment of the witches’ prophecy, Shakespeare’s gripping account of the psychological experience of murder enthralls the imagination. In scenes of nightmarish vividness and language of haunting power, Macbeth represents the profoundest engagement with the forces of evil in all drama.
Lucy Bailey’s previous work at Shakespeare’s Globe includes thrilling productions of Titus Andronicus and Timon of Athens. Elliot Cowan recently played Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire (Donmar), and his screen credits include Mr Darcy in Lost in Austen (ITV).
