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See Macbeth review on the YouTube channel One Minute Theatre Reviews
The first thing to say about Macbeth at the National Theatre is that Rory Kinnear and Anne-Marie Duff as the murderous couple do full justice to Shakespeare’s magnificent poetry and his insights into human nature.
Director Rufus Norris places Macbeth in some post-apocalyptic version of today’s world. Rei Smith’s design is a disaster but not in the way some critics meant. The striking black and broken set underlines that something terrible has happened. Society has broken down into low tech tribes fighting for turf. They exist in ruined buildings, wearing cobbled together clothes and sitting on what looks like furniture salvaged from the tip. The characters’ many different accents take the setting well away from Scotland into what could be any modern war zone.
Beautifully acted by Rory Kinnear & Anne-Marie Duff
Macbeth is an ordinary person who finds himself in this extraordinary situation- and no-one does the complexities that lie beneath ordinary people better than Rory Kinnear. You feel that in peaceful times, his Macbeth could have been the guy from accounts, so low key and sensitive and humorous is his portrayal. Yet, in this time of war, he’s become a successful soldier.
Once his ambition to become the top man is sparked by the witches and his wife, even though he clearly isn’t a leader and despite his conscience and all the horrors, he heroically follows through what he started. Unlike Anne-Marie Duff’s wonderfully agitated Lady Macbeth, who, when tested, can’t cope. Rory Kinnear’s everyman Macbeth does dreadful deeds but makes us wonder what we could be capable of in such violent, anarchic times.
The production is a little lacking in tension at times, especially at the end, which I put down to this grubby small scale war needing to be played out in more confined space than the Olivier. Then again, a smaller theatre would have meant less people getting to see this dystopian, beautifully acted production.
Here’s the review on the YouTube channel One Minute Theatre Reviews-
Macbeth plays at the National Theatre until 23 June and tours the UK from 29 September- Salford, The Lowry 29 Sep – 6 Oct, Plymouth, Theatre Royal 16 – 20 Oct, Edinburgh, Festival Theatre 23 – 27 Oct, Norwich, Theatre Royal 30 Oct – 3 Nov, Aberdeen, His Majesty’s Theatre 7 – 10 Nov, Newcastle, Theatre Royal 13 – 17 Nov, Sheffield, Lyceum 20 – 24 Nov, Bath, Theatre Royal 27 Nov – 8 Dec, Oxford, New Theatre 8 – 12 Jan, Dublin, Bord Gais Energy Theatre 15 – 19 Jan, Nottingham, Theatre Royal 22 – 26 Jan, Hull, New Theatre 5 – 9 Feb, Canterbury, Marlowe Theatre 12 – 16, Glasgow, Theatre Royal 19 – 23 Feb, Southampton, Mayflower Theatre 26 Feb – 2 Mar, Belfast, Grand Opera House 5 – 9 Mar, Wolverhampton, Grand Theatre 12 – 16 Mar, Cardiff, Wales Millennium Centre 19 – 23 Mar.