aaMacbeth

// Macbeth // Abby Amato

// Macbeth  // is a play that centers around the idea that ambition, greed, and absolute power can make one drunk with ego and corruption. The play portrays that once the seed of ambition is planted within, the desire to ascend the ranks of power will stop at nothing. This production of //Macbeth// utilized their costumes, sets and lighting in order to portray how people, specifically those with absolute power, can be infected with ego and desire for more. Their fantastic use of lights and medical supplies in the set and costumes helped to underscore the dark and somber “infected” theme used throughout the play. Another feat of this //Macbeth// production was the amazing set that while imposing, was also easily manipulated into different positions so as to provide different settings for the multiple locations in the play. The only critique I have is that the acting, which swung from one extreme to the other sometimes in an almost over-thought manner, at times seemed to cheapen what was a great production. Luckily the costumes and lighting helped the audience to see past the distracting layer of overacting and become enthralled with the stunning visuals.

The theme of //Macbeth// is ultimately having absolute power corrupts. We see that as Macbeth is fed ideas of grandeur and higher and higher status, he becomes increasingly embedded in his ascent to the throne, and further falls into a pit of escalating unethical and violent behavior. The play insinuates that power can lead to corruption, which is fueled by the infectious dank atmosphere of greed and power. It is as if the promise and idea of power intoxicates Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, who is even more ruthless than her husband. Upon receiving a letter relaying the message of Macbeth being promoted to thaneship of Cawdor, Lady Macbeth professes that she hopes her husband can put aside his humanity in order to achieve his full ambition. She goes even further into her thirst for power by professing that she wishes to be “unsexed”, so she is able to do the awful deeds that are necessary for her to climb the royal ladder. The witches in this play represent the greed that poisons leaders with the greed and insatiable want for more power. They appear on stage every time Macbeth seems to doubt where his ambition has taken him, as if to reassure him his increasingly reckless and chaotic choices are indeed in good measure.

A nother theme of this play is female ambition. It is directly personified through the witches and Lady Macbeth. // Macbeth // seems to imply that woman are just as ambitions and ruthless as men, yet they are confined to using manipulation and witchcraft in order to skirt around society’s norms at the time of women possessing no ambition or want of power. We see that Lady Macbeth and the witches employ Macbeth as if he were a marionette puppet used for their gain and pleasure. Macbeth is essential their pawn they shuffle around the chessboard of political power.

The LED light panels used throughout the play added amazing depth and visual interest, as well as underscored the dark themes of infection and greed. The panels were often used to portray the phantoms Macbeth’s guilt kept conjuring up. The panels enabled the audience to understand why Macbeth would be so afraid of these imagined horrific visions he keeps experiencing. They also were utilized in the famous scene of the witches creating a spell for Macbeth around a cauldron. The light panels were used to illustrate the boiling cauldron, which only added more gravity and theatricality to an already electrifying scene. The lighting was also used in the costumes, which I thought worked fantastically for the witches’ costumes. There was one scene in particular, where the set went dark and all the audience could see were the LED lights used to illuminate the witches’ bodies making them look as if they were horrific skeletons cavorting about on stage, delighting in the greed and downfall of man. The lighting was also used to highlight the theme of infection as the green light from the witches could be seen at many times throughout the play being passed on (infecting) other characters, especially in the final scene where the curse of greed is passed onto a new character after the death of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, represented by the haunting visual of the glowing green light signifying the curse of ambition, leaving the audience with an uneasy, yet entranced feeling. The lights of the set and the costumes helped to define not only the characters, but gave a palpable feel of evil and increasing anarchy throughout the play.

The use of medical supplies in the costume was another brilliant way to further the symbolic theme of infection throughout the play. Hospital supplies are associated with disease and death, both of which are important to the message of //Macbeth//. The “disease” of greed and ambition leads to the cataclysmic amount of carnage witnessed and ultimately the destruction of the main protagonists in the play. They provide a dark, almost sickly reminder of what ambition can do to the soul.

The set was also stunning. The large budget was evident with the construction of this large and mutable set. It provided the backdrop to every scene and because it was cleverly divided into three sections t could easily be transformed into the different settings the paly required, helping the audience to better envision the frequent and rapid change of scenes.

The acting, while at times enrapturing, was also a little over the top. While I do acknowledge that this is an incredibly dramatic play and delves further into insanity as the play goes, it was borderline overdone. While the actor who played Hamlet had amazing control of his lines and possessed a great ability to project his voice, it would sometimes venture into a soap opera-esque acting style that was very contrived and over acted. At times his hysterics were almost comical because they were so extreme. I also thought Lady Macbeth, while again possessing an amazing handle on her lines, sometimes infused a strange comical edge to her character, almost ruining the maliciousness that is supposed to be felt by Lady Macbeth. I thought at times the acting took a weird venture (when it was not supposed to) into making Macbeth and Lady Macbeth into farcical characters, which I believe is not the point of this dark and odious play.

Overall this production was skillfully and artfully done. With the slight exception of occasional over acting, the lighting, sets, costumes, and themes all culminated in a visually stunning and thought provoking rendering of //Macbeth//.