Controversy has followed the Denver Center for the Performing Arts’ (DCPA) rendition of Macbeth, a version consisting of an all male cast and a modern framework.
The show is blatantly sexual, with leather and feathered costumes covering all but the actor’s midriffs. Electronic music pulsated throughout the intimate theatre. The show opened with three witches (or in this instance warlocks) performing an openly satanic spell to tell the tragic story of a fallen king. In short, it’s untraditional.
For those unfamiliar with the storyline it can be easy to get lost. One is expected to know that the character Banquo is not only Macbeth’s lover (a new addition to the script) but his comrade in arms, until the latter is promoted and gets a taste for power.
Many of the scenes and props were minimalistic in nature. Glowing gloves replace the glowing daggers in the imagination of the murderous king, and his decapitation is mimed rather than performed.
The show takes many liberties with the original, short of cutting it down. The three hour play contained every word scribbled by the quill of the Bard simply reimagined.
Veering sharply from the original narrative, King Duncan’s footmen serve more as sexual servants. The seyton steps from a typically flat character to a servant in love with the king, and Lady Macduff futilely fights for her life rather than meekly submitting to the will of the assassins.
The show pushes the envelope, while still telling the tale of the ambitious King Macbeth who dared kill all who stood in his way, with the help of his wife, as the two fell into madness. In fact, director Robert O’Hara would say these changes tell the tale more purely than those we have seen of late. By going back to the roots of the production of an all male cast, an entirely new character dynamic is revealed.
What does an all male cast do to Macbeth? “I hope it will do exactly what Shakespeare’s work should always do – give some insight into the world in which we are living today,” O’Hara told the Denver Center Blog.
“Macbeth,” in its essence, is a very masculine production. It was written by a man to be played by all men, as the primarily male characters battle for dominance. Shakespeare used the themes of sex, violence and the supernatural in all of his plays to keep the audiences coming. These same subjects that fascinated crowds then draws us in still, and the DCPA rendition capitalizes upon that.
The use of only men in such a masculine play also allows for an analysis of the character relationships. Dominance is at the forefront of every interaction, and small actions are given huge meaning. We can see Lady Macbeth and her husband’s true conniving nature, as he plots from the very beginning, and she uses cunning and deceit to lure the victims in.
Both positive and negative reviews have flooded in, each with merit. Traditionalists balk at the use of such modern interpretation, while progressives embrace the pulsating music and party aesthetic.
This is, however, what Shakespeare intended. His works drew in audiences of all classes, both the upper crust and the groundlings. Lately his name has been said in posh tones with upturned nose, but here O’Hara invites the layman to the theatre, and with this invitation restores some balance to the Bard.
The DCPA’s newly reimagined telling of Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” is a show not to be missed, as the audience reconciles the ancient with the modern in a tale that never ends by the man who created the tragic genre. And this time, there’s leather.
