Memorable Macbeth
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
No toil and trouble in Bell Shakespeare performance.
Lead on John Bell. Show us the way to reinterpret centuries-old text and have a team of actors deliver it as though they were the first to speak those most familiar phrases that have become part of our everyday vernacular. With its namesake and driving force at the helm, the Bell Shakespeare company has hit town again with that infamous brutal tale of naked ambition, Macbeth.
The blood-letting begins when Macbeth hears the prophecies of three witches he encounters who predict he will rise through the ranks and become king of Scotland.
At home, his manipulative and equally ambitious wife ultimately shames her husband into murdering the current king Duncan and so begins a series of slayings as Macbeth attains then fights to keep his position.
At first, Sean O'Shea seems a strange choice as Macbeth. A lean streak of a man, he appears skittish and scruffy. But his performance eveolves as his character develops, firstly panicked by hus murderous acts, then maddened by guilt and finally resigned to his cold evil state.
Linda Cropper is superb as Lady Macbeth, her classic beauty contrasting with her trecherous mind and blood-thristy words.
Bell uses a deceptively small cast of 11 to fulfill all the roles, the double-ups so impressive it seems there must be several missing at the curtain call.
Rochelle Smith
Geelong Advertiser, Saturday 21 April 2007