Theatre Reviews

Though a unique take on Shakespeare's shortest surviving tragedy, SITI Company's production is a work which is often hard to fathom and requires significant input from the audience in trying to unravel what exactly it is the production is trying to achieve.

Set in the 1940s, 'Radio Macbeth' takes place late at night in an abandoned theatre where a group of radio actors arrive in separate groups to rehearse 'Macbeth'. Each arrives on to the bare stage with the minimum of interaction between each other before circling restlessly around one-and-other and rehearsing the play. As their rehearsal continues, the actors become increasingly consumed and somewhat possessed by the great Bard's words.

What the SITI Company aim to achieve in adapting Shakespeare's play in this form is, according to its notes, to demonstrate how the actors in the theatre are surrounded by "the ghosts of all previous productions" each of whom has "an axe to grind". The notes go on to say: "As the spirits of ambition and violence encroach, the actors cling to the sanity of words in a desperate bid to dispel the furies."

However little of this is achieved and for the most part the take on 'Macbeth' seems muddled in its execution as it veers between bored readings of actors going through the motions and intense over-the-top portrayals of particular scenes. Throughout you are left wondering what exactly the point is, while the notion of ghosts consuming the actors is largely lacking and something the audience is forced to learn of through purchase of a programme.

In saying that however, 'Radio Macbeth' does have flashes of genius in emphasising how a Shakespearean play, so complex in parts, can be so easily staged and imagined using just the power of an actor's voice.

This is a radio adaptation we're watching remember and so there is much sublime emphasis on sound. The soliloquies are told through booming microphones and in the famous porter's scene after Duncan's murder, Kelly Maurer (who plays the Witch, Porter, Lady Macduff and a Gentlewoman) slaps the table seemingly endlessly with a two-by-four before delivering a haunting take on the porter's speech. Use of sound and minimal props also sees the violence of a sword fight wonderfully conveyed using only the clapping sound of folding chairs.

Credit too must go to an opening subtext which bristles with humour in throwing a slant on Shakespeare's words. On arrival onstage there is some tension between actor Ellen Lauren (who plays Lady Macbeth) and Will Bond (who plays Duncan, Macduff, a murderer and the doctor).

They are having something of a lover's tiff and as the play moves on, it appears she and actor Stephen Webber (who plays Macbeth) are having a secretive affair. The humour here of course is driven by the characters they play in 'Macbeth' and the situation unearths an interesting subtext in the dialogue they exchange. When the character of Duncan is killed off in the play, so too tragically is this subtext.

Fine performances are complimented by exquisite vintage costumes from James Schuette, most notably that of Ellen Lauren's red dress.

However, though 'Radio Macbeth' remains an imaginative way of tackling Shakespeare, not even its actors can save what is ultimately a muddled and confused work which is not quite confident enough in fulfilling its basic ambitions.

By Steve Cummins