Peter Viney's Blog

By William Shakespeare
Directed by Max Webster
Designed by Roazanna Vize

Filmed Live at the Donmar Warehouse,London
Streamed Poole Lighthouse, 15th February 2025

CAST:
David Tennant – Macbeth
Cush Jumbo- Lady Macbeth
Cal Macaninch- Banquo
Noof Ousellam – Macduff
Rona Morison – Lady Macduff
Jatinder Singh Randhawa- The Porter / Seyton
Ross Watt- Malcolm
Benny Young – Duncan / Doctor
Moyo Akande – Ross
Brian James O’Sullivan – Donalblain, solier, murderer, musician
Annie Grace- musician, gentlewoman
Casper Knopf – Macduff’sson, Fleance. Young Siward
Kathleen MacInnes – Singer, ensemble
Alasdair Macrae – musician, ensemble

It was near impossible to get tickets to see this at the tiny 250 seat Donmar Warehouse in London. You have to be a friend / member as it sells out so quickly normally, though even faster with David Tennant in the lead role. Donmar lists standing tickets at £20 and limited day tickets at £25, but Ticketmaster had the ‘best seats’ at £295. Is this reselling? I looked on line and premium seats were £250 anyway. Ludicrous. Memories of the Benedict Cumberbatch Hamlet. Sold out. Incredibly expensive. Several empty seats and the party of Russians near us talked through and left at the interval. These ultra pricey seats go to major companies who buy them for visiting clients, some of whom don’t want to go.

It’s a pity. as the Donmar is a very friendly little theatre with helpful staff. So streaming is next best thing at only £12.10. The original production had binaural 3D sound “which the audience will experience through wearing headphones, placing them right inside the head of the central couple.” Max Webster must have a thing about Dr Who, what with directing Ncuti Gatwa (15th doctor) in The Importance of Being Earnest at The National, and Macbeth at the Donmar with David Tennant (10th doctor, who was in Broadchurch with 13th doctor Jodie Whittaker), running at the same time. There can’t be any two such contrasting production styles.

I reckon the capacity was below 250 at the Donmar because the actors circled the thrust stage on the outside which may have necessitated losing the front rows. The stage has audience on three stages with a glass wall at the back. The stage is white. The cast are dressed in black and grey, except Lady Macbeth in white. The effect is like a B&W graphic novel. It means blood is a dramatic splash of red. In the final closing scene it’s like the old riddle, What’s black and white and red all over? (A newspaper). Here it’s the stage.

The sound first. No headsets, but they had utilised at least a 7.1 surround sound mix, because noises came from behind, above, left or right. The witches never appear, they’re just whispered voices from other cast members, half hidden in murk behind the glass … then the audio mixed the sound to surround positions around us. It was disconcerting. This wasn’t aided from behind is where someone had a box of wrapped sweets. It was scrabble noisily in the box. Extract sweet. Unwrap, chomp sweet, start scrabbling for the next one right away. Fortunately the box was exhausted in twenty minutes.

It was a relief when the sound came directly from the screen from Macbeth and Banquo.

The camera direction is exemplary. They have cameras from all angles, plus one directly above the stage centre pointing down. The production is fluid, never letting up for a moment. It’s played without an interval (I usually disapprove) but it lasts just 114 minutes, which is fine. As with all filmed theatre, you have to compare with the experience of being there. It is different. David Tennant knows where to find a camera, and speaks directly into it in close ups. I wondered about the reality in the room about the cast playing to three sides. If you were there, you’d have seen a lot of backs of heads. That doesn’t happen on video.

The costume is from a dystopia. All wear black kilts, though judging the length and the wrap sides, I’d say ‘man skirts’ though they are designed to conjure kilts. When the porter improvises his scene, he does the old joke. ‘Don’t call it a skirt. It’s a kilt. Why is it called a kilt? Because anyone who calls it a skirt, is going to get kilt (killed).’ Accents are Scottish, except for Lady Macbeth. The James McAvoy version some years ago did the same. I’ve no opinion. They were all crystal clear, which hasn’t been true of all Scottish accent productions. Shakespeare would probably have avoided accents, because James I might have thought he was taking the piss. Let alone how many Londoners would have ever heard a Scottish accent?

There’s live music throughout, often running at an ambient level. The band have to take ensemble parts throughout. Alasdair Macrae from the ceilidh band looked the most murderous second murderer one could imagine as well as playing violin, while Brian James O’Sullivan has significant roles as Donalblain and First Murderer as well as playing accordion.

There is one superb Ceilidh / Scottish Country Dance scene with full on music. In my primary school days we did English country dancing, which was about the same. Why? When I was an ELT teacher, we had Scottish country dancing once a month with the local Caledonian Society demonstrating in full gear. I was sometimes paid to supervise. This dance was a high point.

The play is also cut around and scenes switched, so the Banquo banquet (sorry) scene starts, but then Macbeth takes the murderer’s report in the middle of it rather than before. When we’re at Macduff’s castle, it’s Lady Macbeth who replaces the messenger which gives a twist at a deep level.

So what makes it different? First the high intensity of David Tennant and Cush Jumbo in the lead roles. The quality of acting is outstanding. Cal Macaninch as Banquo is as powerful as I’ve seen the part, exuding Scottishness to the point where he could walk into an Inverness pub and people would ask ‘Who’s the Scottish-looking man?’

Noof Ousellam is a strong Macduff, particularly in the last scene where Macbeth tries to force Macduff to kill him. There’s gender blind casting, but Moyo Akandé as Ross, removes any doubts by striding on and lifting Macbeth into the air. Ros Watt excels as a trans Malcolm. No weak spots.

Praise to Jatinder Singh Randhawa as the porter. They’ve gone the whole hog in abandoning almost every line Shakespeare wrote and playing it from scratch. Sometimes that doesn’t work (notably in The Winter’s Tale at The Globe last year). Here it does. Clown interludes would have been contemporary, and semi-improvised. What we have printed is what one actor did on one day, I suspect. So the porter struggles up, crashes into a beam, and exclaims, ‘Fuck! A wall!’ then gets the audience going with audience participation. He signals the band for ‘Knock knock’ and the audience has to chant ‘Who’s there?’ He addresses the audience individually, jokes about the headsets, makes up some lines on the day. It’s not a porter for the purists, but well executed stand-up, and it serves, as Shakespeare intended, as a sudden tension breaker from the intensity.

We discussed it at length afterwards. There is an emotional distance to it. There’s a creepiness as Macbeth interacts with Fleance and then the Macduff son. It’s Macbeth who watches from afar, and then carries young Macduff off in the Lady Macduff murder scene (which takes place in the daek). The children work better than usual, because the binaural sound means everyone has head mics. You would normally avoid that in a theatre this intimate.

It’s dramatic with a capital D. It is minimalist, and feels contemporary. As Karen added, it exudes maleness, and uses Lady Macbeth’s lines to include her. Violent males strutting about and dominating as in 2025 global politics.

It has tremendous pace and momentum. David Tennant was interviewed by The Guardian:

David Tennant: “What I’m finding most difficult is the variety of options. I thought I knew this play very well and that it was, unlike any other Shakespeare I can remember rehearsing, straightforward. But each time I come to a scene, it goes in a direction I wasn’t expecting. It has such muscle to it, it powers along. Plot-wise, it’s more front-footed than any Shakespeare play I’ve done.

It is a major version. We both agreed we were on the edge of our seats, but admired it more than we liked it. I’m not sure why. It will be on streamed services, but it is so intense that a cinema helps, particularly with a sound plot more complex than a simple sound bar can deal with. You can’t argue its five stars.

*****

WHAT THE PAPERS SAID

LINKS ON THIS SITE:

MACBETH
Macbeth – McAvoy 2013, Trafalgar Studio, James McAvoy as Macbeth
Macbeth, RSC 2011 Jonathan Slinger as Macbeth
Macbeth – Tara Arts 2015 (Shakespeare’s Macbeth) on tour, Poole Lighthouse
Macbeth, Young Vic, 2015
Macbeth – Globe 2016, Ray Fearon as Macbeth
Macbeth, RSC 2018, Christopher Ecclestone as Macbeth
Macbeth, National Theatre 2018, Rory Kinnear as Macbeth
Macbeth, Wanamaker Playhouse 2018, Paul Ready as Macbeth
Macbeth, Watermill, 2019. Billy Postlethwaite as Macbeth
Macbeth, Chichester 2019, John Simm as Macbeth
Macbeth, RSC 2023, Reuben Joseph as Macbeth
Macbeth, Globe 2023, Max Bennett as Macbeth
Macbeth, Donmar 2025, David Tennant as Macbeth
Macbeth RSC 2025, Sam Heughan as Macbeth.

MAX WEBSTER, Director
The Importance of Being Earnest, National Theatre 2024
Much Ado About Nothing, Globe 2014

DAVID TENNANT
Don Juan in Soho London 2017
Richard II, RSC, 2013