The other thing I had so wrong – and why it proved so useful to go through all these experiences again as I did – was that I always focused – and put the whole tragedy – on the main protagonist. I had liked the Stratford “Macbeth” mainly because I finally saw a Macbeth who was like a human being I could understand, and I liked it even better in the aftermath, when I read an interview with Chris Eccleston which contained rather a few things I could connect with – though I only remember his scepticism about the issue of manliness and the male image which was really revealing. (The biographical background and the striking sensitivity of the interviewer conveyed an impression of him as a totally “no bullshit” person who knows what he wants and what he can do, and would call a spade a spade no matter what others might call it. Which rather corresponds with what I have seen of his acting that always struck me as exceptionally honest – in the sense that he just wouldn’t do anything he isn’t completely convinced about.) And I liked it still more, watching the DVD again, finally able to put the pieces together and appreciate how precise his acting was, and also what everybody had done on that stage. Obviously, Chris Eccleston pulled his weight, but it also became clear that I had to shift my focus. “The Tragedie of Macbeth” is in fact a misleading title, though not, as I thought, because of the “tragedy” bit. This was actually the moment where I saw the woods appear behind the trees and understood that an important part of what’s wrong with Macbeth were just my own expectation. In a very literal sense that had gradually be dawning on me, even Macbeth is ONLY JUST HUMAN
. But before I come to the bigger picture, I’ll come to the details of the production, that is, the “positives”:
HUMOUR
Compared to other “dark” plays like “Othello”, “Richard III” (which I have down as Shakespeare’s best comedy!), even “Hamlet”, “Macbeth” seems rather devoid of humour. At least I can’t see it, apart from a very dark irony that is not really a laughing matter. This kind was well represented by the porter, or rather “caretaker”, taking care of death in the manner his colleagues in the sixties took care of the facilities in their schools or apartment blocks: not over-enthusiastically. A subtle hint not to take all the fuss too seriously. “Things at the worst will change …” It will probably all be reset in two hours. The humour in “Macbeth” is kind of an underhand affair, but it is there. In retrospect – and apart from the “Shakespeare Retold” that wasn’t really Shakespeare – this production was actually the funniest I have seen, but there might be room for improvement …?
I forgot to mention the Globe Theatre’s “Macbeth” in my general survey, which I also have on DVD (– makes me wonder how many more I may have seen and dismissed!?) It wasn’t one of the worst, though not very entertaining or surprising either, with Macbeth meeting the usual clichés; but one scene stood out which usually belongs to the boring bits: the meeting between Macduff and Malcolm at the English court which they played as a funny scene – as if Macduff didn’t take Malcolm quite seriously. Strictly speaking, that doesn’t really work, but it made me aware of the absurdity of the situation Macbeth has initiated. It was a bit like “The Death of Stalin” which is in fact a funny film that gives you the creeps: Sometimes humour is much better at making us see how WRONG things are than highlighting the atrocities we got used to a long time ago. (This totally changes, of course, as soon as they start happening TO US!) I notice that I am still undecided about humour in “Macbeth”; the play cannot be the exception to my rule that “Shakespeare” without humour is not “Shakespeare”. The two kinds I detected so far certainly worked.
MADNESS
The single feature I am most grateful for – apart from Christopher Eccleston playing Macbeth! – was the ABSENCE OF MADNESS. At least where Macbeth is concerned. His Macbeth didn’t go mad, and as this was the best Macbeth I have seen on a stage, I know now that I have been right all this time. It totally works!
As I have to raise the issue of madness at some point and it never seems to fit in, I’ll do it now. I have always been totally convinced that it is not just unnecessary for Macbeth to go mad but a distortion of the story. Lady Macbeth’s madness, in my opinion, is a completely different affair, and I’ll come to that. There are two points, though, that have to be cleared up about Macbeth and madness. The first one is that he “sees things” that other people cannot see. On an Elizabethan stage, Macbeth panicking because he sees Banquo’s spirit in the banquet scene whereas nobody else can see him would have been greeted as first rate entertainment. Nobody would have wondered about his state of mind because the kind of psychological consistency “we” are trying to create on a stage didn’t apply. WE would certainly want to make up our mind about WHAT KIND OF GUY this Macbeth is – or at least the actor would want to do that. And THIS guy already HAS seen or heard things nobody else could see or hear.
There probably is a significant contradiction between my awareness that psychology was of little consequence on an Elizabethan stage and my conviction that Shakespeare’s real calling was the workings of the human mind and soul. I have actually no clue how to overcome this contradiction – thrilling because this tells me I must be wrong about SOMETHING – yeah!!! - but my experience is that in most cases I examined a convincing psychological explanation could be found, either by me or some actor who played it. They are, of course, almost always reductive. Unless proved otherwise, the opposite might work just as well. Still, I am always looking for consistencies. And I found one, I think, about Macbeth “seeing things”.
Of course, all of this stuff about Banquo appearing on the stage in person and the dagger being there for everybody to see or not initially is about what works on the stage, not about psychology. Usually, the dagger is not really there for the audience to see, and that seems entirely consistent. In the banquet scene sometimes different solutions are tried out. Claudia reported one where they repeated the scene the first time without Banquo, the second time with him (or the other way round?). Not having seen it, I cannot imagine what this would achieve. In the “Stratford Macbeth” they only brought in Banquo at the second “call” and played the beginning of the scene without him. Not a bad idea because it brings in a sense of escalation. I am always slightly pissed off that the ghost never enters on Macbeth’s call, but this is actually intended. I checked the first folio, and there the ghost turns up both times BEFORE Macbeth mentions Banquo. I’d like to find an explanation for this!
(Oh – and I might have done so! That’s my “easter egg”, see below …)
Looking at it through psychological glasses, the bodily appearance brings the AGGRAVATION of a situation that has been there already before Macbeth has any reason to become “mad” = before the killing of Duncan. It could be seen as obsession. Macbeth becomes obsessed with the idea of the murder and conjures the dagger and the atmosphere of darkness and horror to go with it. It is something that Lady Macbeth does as well – strategically! – when she conjures the “spirits” that must be somewhere out there to “tend on mortal thoughts” and help her follow through with her evil plan; but there is a difference. Only a slight difference in the beginning, but Macbeth doesn’t have to conjure the dagger, he SEES the dagger, and THEN the mental image initiates the other fantasies. After the murder, Macbeth is visibly shocked, whereas his wife is not affected RIGHT THEN in the same way; her attempt at convincing herself that “the sleeping and the dead are but as pictures” and it is “the eye of childhood that fears a painted devil” works for the time being. She cannot deal with the blood, as we will see, whereas Macbeth is dealing with it on the spot – which actually gives him a better chance of overcoming the trauma! In my opinion, he doesn’t “crack” later – that is: become dysfunctional - whereas his wife does. He also hears voices in the aftermath of the murder - whereas Lady Macbeth only hears what is really there - and gets so scared that we must assume they are real for him. Again, this gives him an opportunity to mentally deal with what has happened.
So, when Banquo actually appears on the stage, this is an aggravation of something that has occurred before, especially as it now becomes public, but also because it has become impossible for him to attribute it to his imagination as he did with the dagger; and the audience can appreciate the climax when Banquo turns up for real – if only because of the shock effect. - It struck me recently, thinking about this scene, that the excuse Lady Macbeth makes for his behaviour – that he has been like this “from his youth” – might not have been entirely made up. She is the one who knows that he has seen things – the only one he could have told about the “air-drawn dagger”. It is something that comes to her at this moment to use – something she has never really understood about her husband: that he has this vivid imagination which makes him get awe-struck and over-excited quite easily. In fact, this already plays a role in the beginning, considering how different he and Banquo react to the weird sisters, respectively in the way this misunderstanding is created about how to deal with the prophecies: Macbeth still “toys” with the possibility of killing Duncan – as ONE option that, in my opinion, he never really intended to see through! – whereas for his wife it’s an unequivocal call to action.
This “disposition” might not really have caused a problem BEFORE HE MET THE WEIRD SISTERS. Thinking this through, it struck me how fundamentally Shakespeare deals with the reality of EVIL in “Macbeth”. It would definitely go beyond any scope to reflect to what extent “we” have come to rationalize evil, almost to the point of total denial, and how impressed I was therefore – and still am! – by Tolkien having reinstated it as a REALITY that CAN be defeated … In “Macbeth”, the evil is equally real – that is: existent “outside” of evil people and their “timely” dealings - but we tend to rationalize it away by marginalizing its “instruments” or putting a piece of actual reality in its place we think we understand - like war in the National Theatre’s “Macbeth” with Rory Kinnear. But even if we were able to understand it, there would be little chance to defeat it because the devil cannot be targeted directly, and his ways are entirely too clever for us. I think that, in coming in contact with the weird sisters, the inherent danger in Macbeth’s condition becomes aggravated because his human weaknesses are the places where evil can take root. In more than one respect, the aggravation of his “infirmity” endangers his own state of mind and, like a virus, makes evil spread to other people. The banquet scene is such an important step in Macbeth’s downfall because it damages his standing as king and therefore the loyalty of his followers, and, “in conclusion”, the institution of kingship itself. A state of affairs that, in Shakespeare’s world, can only beget tyranny.
Having come so far, I can suddenly see that the second aspect of madness in “Macbeth” – the more important one – is in fact closely linked to the first. I always had this feeling that this change from a basically decent person in the beginning into a bloody tyrant – to be crammed into two hours of stage time! – is impossible to explain – or represent – convincingly. There the madness helps, but the reason I fundamentally object is that it achieves nothing apart from “explaining” everything “away”. It sweeps aside psychology together with any social and political implications which, I think, Shakespeare laid down in depth. The problem is, as so often in “Shakespeare”, that it is actually MORE complicated than I – or most directors dealing with the play – are prepared to consider. There are psychological reasons – like stress and fear – AND social reasons – like distrust and isolation – AND political reasons, as I just explained, that alter Macbeth, AND, on top of all that, EVIL as this kind of catalyst that nobody can predict or understand … The human being Macbeth struggles with all of them, and the struggle might sometimes make him appear insane because he has put himself into such a perverse position. But, in my opinion, this struggle shouldn’t be shown as a mental condition.
So, I am surprised one more time of how much can be achieved by taking psychological issues in “Shakespeare” seriously! – Not so good: In fact, I must appear mad to anybody but myself given the amount of time I have now spent on this already epic treatise that nobody will ever read, neglecting my health, my household duties, my social relationships and probably my work – and still It feels as if I have only scratched the surface. It is obvious that this kind of complexity can never be adequately represented on a stage. My inner “Macbeth” may contain all this and try to find solutions, but in an actual stage situation lines have to be cut and decisions have to be made. In fact, the “Stratford Macbeth” showed me the meaning of “adding by subtracting”.
THE LADY
As I already mentioned, in the case of Lady Macbeth madness is entirely acceptable, probably even necessary. I still think there will be a post about the lady, and this one is already too long, so I am just stating it at this point. Nonetheless, I don’t like it. I didn’t like Niamh Cusack running about the stage like a crazy hen, and I didn’t like her acting which seemed to me overdone and without depth. When I watched it again recently, I didn’t like it much better, but it suddenly made sense. I saw that I had dismissed her Lady Macbeth more on a point of principle than bad acting because I hate Lady Macbeth being shown as weak and damaged FROM THE START. She has to be the one who has this sway over Macbeth to turn him around, she cannot be this pitiful creature … This time, the broadening of my perspective in the meantime allowed me to see what they were doing. I still don’t think that it is what Shakespeare has written, but what he has written might not be what serves his purpose best under any circumstances. In the context of THIS production, the relationship between Macbeth and his wife had to be clear and concise, and obvious, as it was clearly just a little piece in a complicated puzzle, but has to contain this important turning point. I am always trying to see a relationship between husband and wife on the stage and usually fail, and I could see nothing on the part of Lady Macbeth this time – but the way Macbeth REACTED to her made me glimpse, just in one moment, the COMPLETE relationship and history of this couple! I always had this feeling that Macbeth – though he adores her – is a little bit afraid of his wife. In this case, he is more than a little bit afraid FOR his wife because he knows that she is vulnerable. And as soon as I saw it, the behaviour Lady Macbeth displays makes complete sense. Macbeth doesn’t dare to go against his wife because he fears the consequences for their relationship – which is kind of what Lady Macbeth says, just from a “stronger” position, when she threatens: “From this time such I account thy love”. But frailty can be as powerful a weapon in a relationship, even if it is not wielded consciously, and the more I think about it, the more I can see how it worked because it made me see a lot I always WANTED to see in a production of “Macbeth” but never did. First of all, there IS a relationship of a couple with a long history – predominantly painful, but they are visibly and strongly linked through this pain. And it provides an opportunity to show Macbeth as somebody who CARES – who is capable of empathy = the “milk of human kindness” Lady Macbeth is talking about. At the end, all this is gone. Macbeth cares about nobody but himself, and this is enough to show the enormous change he has undergone as a human being. The desired effect is achieved “quietly”, without raving and shouting, with marvellous efficiency. And even though I still don’t like it, it is much easier for Lady Macbeth to become mad when she is “unstable” from the beginning. I regret it because a lot of great “Lady Macbeth stuff” just goes down the drain, as usual, but in the context of this production, where time and timing literally are “of the essence”, it is a comparatively small sacrifice. As I already wrote, there are greater things at stake …
Keine Kommentare:
Kommentar veröffentlichen