Macbeth - GRADS Theatre Company

Reviewed by Paul Treasure

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One of, if not the, most frequently performed Shakespeare plays in the past decade, Macbeth is GRADS Theatre Company’s latest production at the New Fortune Theatre in the Arts Building at UWA. One of Perth community theatre’s best Shakespearean actresses, Grace Edwards, has made the move to the other side of the footlights and tried her hand at directing for the first time, giving us an intriguing and thought-provoking production. Eschewing any need for gimmickry, on the surface, this is a fairly standard production; the milieu is contemporary yet non-specific. The soldiers wear dark clothes with Kevlar vests; other characters wear contemporary yet timeless street clothes. It is a production that could be set anywhere and at any time in the last few decades. This vagueness of setting becomes one of the production’s strengths, as it allows us to clearly focus on the universality of the play without distraction.

Edwards has taken what shouldn’t be, but often is, the radical approach of actually doing some research into the historical people presented onstage, leading to her making some very bold directorial choices that, in hindsight, make absolute sense, and left this reviewer gobsmacked that no one else has ever picked up on them before. It is mentioned a number of times in the script that Macbeth has no children of his own, however it is a historic fact that the real Lady Macbeth, Gruoch, did have a child from a previous marriage who was alive at the time of the events portrayed, and did briefly succeed Macbeth as King of Scotland. Edwards has chosen to reframe the role of Seyton as Lady Macbeth’s son, giving Lady Macbeth a more rounded character and making her more than just Macbeth’s partner.

Another bold and exciting choice was to beef up the character of Lady Macduff. Instead of limiting her to her one brief scene, Edwards has rethought Macduff’s late entry to Glamis, giving Lennox’s lines to Lady Macduff, and presenting us with the entire Macduff family. A gorgeously humorous scene, as the Macduff children play up, as children do. This gives the Macduffs the air of that one family within a social group that has young children and are perpetually late and flustered. This sets us up to make the later scenes even more heartbreaking as we feel that we actually know and care about this family, and lends even more weight to Macduff’s outburst that “He has no children”. It also allows Edwards to pull off one of the greatest masterstrokes of the entire production, as a bloodied and Banquo-like Macduff daughter appears to Lady Macbeth during the sleepwalking scene, driving home to Lady Macbeth the horrors of the inhumane crimes that she has been complicit in, not just to combatants, but to innocent women and children. It is also well worth noting that all acts of violence against women in this production take place offstage.

Patrick Downes is easily one of the best Shakespearean actors in Perth; his combination of diction, presence, and understanding of the text is second to none. An obvious choice to play Macbeth, he gave us a subtle and nuanced rendering. Often downplaying the character’s anger, allowing him to quietly and menacingly seethe, rather than accept the temptation to become the raging shouty man that so many other portrayals fall back on. Laura Connolly as Lady Macbeth has the unenviable task of keeping up with Downes. She is especially strong in her scenes with Seyton and truly heartbreaking in her portrayal of guilt in the sleepwalking scene.

The Macduff family, as a whole, were played well. Jason Dohle as Macduff came across initially as a warm and cuddly dad who truly loved his family. A good choice character-wise, as it gave even more power to his shift after he learns of his family’s murder. Tamar Basini was beautiful as Lady Macduff, truly flustered in her early scene, and devastating in her final scene, as she moves from a ferocious mama bear willing to defend her cubs, until the moment when she realises that they are all gone and she disintegrates as she becomes aware for the first time of her own danger. Nate Tonkin and Odette Prince-Lizamo played the children with a very real sense of sibling mischievousness, with Prince-Lizamo pulling off a truly eerie and unnerving presence as her character’s ghost.

Alan Gill was a very strong Banquo while he was alive, but his ghost in the banquet scene needs to be seen to be believed. Entering from the courtyard behind the New Fortune stage, we become aware of the vague presence of a figure in white menacingly approaching the stage, but we cannot see him clearly until he enters for his cue. Yvette Drager-Wetherilt has done a truly horrific job designing Banquo’s makeup, unsettling and nauseating right down to the dried blood caking the top of his head. Gill leans in to this look, taking advantage of his tall, lean frame and imbuing Banquo with a ghoulish intensity. Between the two of them, they have managed to create a truly frightening ghost.

In such a bleak play as Macbeth, the famous Porter’s speech is justly renowned for its comic potential. Nera Camponovo, entering from behind the audience, gives us an energetic and hilarious rendition, getting right into the faces of audience members they have decided to single out as the various characters they describe. This is one of the best deliveries of this speech that I have yet heard.

While the production hole was excellent, no production of Macbeth will ever be perfect, and there were a couple of missteps that slightly lessened the impact. A formal dance early on that felt forced; the repeated use of a song that may have been intended to add commentary but seemed out of place; a dagger whose placement was anything but with its handle towards Macbeth’s hand. Small things, trivial things, but things which drew us out of the moment.

As a directorial debut, this production has introduced Perth’s community theatre to a very strong and interesting new voice, and future productions by Edwards should be met with anticipation.

Reviewer Note: Huge thanks to my guest for the evening, Benjamin Small, whose insight into some of the directorial choices was instrumental to the writing of this review. Tickets for this review were provided by the theatre company.