Macbeth

En medio de truenos y relámpagos, tres brujas deciden que su próximo encuentro será con Macbeth, el señor de Glamis . En la siguiente escena, los soldados informan al rey Duncan de Escocia que sus generales Banquo y Macbeth acaban de derrotar una rebelión liderada por el traidor señor de Cawdor , aliado con fuerzas de Noruega e Irlanda. Duncan elogia a sus hombres por su valentía y destreza en el combate, y anuncia que el título de señor de Cawdor pasará a manos de Macbeth.

Mientras vagaban por un páramo , Macbeth y Banquo se quedan perplejos cuando aparecen las tres brujas, quienes proféticamente proclaman a Macbeth como "Barón de Glamis" y "Barón de Cawdor", y luego dicen que "será rey en el futuro". Cuando Banquo pregunta por su propia fortuna, las brujas responden que engendrará una estirpe de reyes, aunque él mismo no será uno de ellos. Las brujas desaparecen y llega el Barón de Ross, quien informa a Macbeth de su nuevo título: Barón de Cawdor. La primera profecía de las brujas se cumple así, y Macbeth comienza de inmediato a albergar nerviosas ambiciones de convertirse en rey. El propio rey Duncan pronto da la bienvenida y elogia a Macbeth y Banquo, declarando que todos pasarán la noche en el castillo de Macbeth en Inverness ; además, el hijo de Duncan, Malcolm, es anunciado como su heredero oficial. Macbeth envía una carta a su esposa, Lady Macbeth, sobre las brujas que les esperan. Lady Macbeth está decidida a que ella y su esposo asesinen a Duncan para obtener la corona. Cuando Macbeth llega a Inverness, ella lo convence de matar al rey esa misma noche. Planean emborrachar a los dos sirvientes de Duncan para que pierdan el conocimiento; así, a la mañana siguiente, podrán inculparlos del asesinato.

^{Esa noche, a pesar de} sus dudas y de varios presagios sobrenaturales, incluyendo la alucinación de una daga manchada ^de sangre, ^Macbeth sale de escena y apuñala a Duncan mientras duerme. Al regresar, está tan conmocionado que Lady Macbeth lo encuentra aún sosteniendo las dagas ensangrentadas, por lo que lo reprende, recordándole que deben dejarlas en manos de los sirvientes de Duncan mientras duermen. Ella toma los cuchillos y los coloca de nuevo en la habitación de Duncan. Cuando la pareja oye que llaman a la puerta del castillo, se apresuran a irse a la cama.

A drunken porter opens the gate, admitting Macduff (the Thane of Fife) and a nobleman named Lennox: they wish to visit the king. Macbeth, greeting them, leads them to Duncan's chamber. Macduff enters the chamber then returns to the stage, announcing with shock the murder of Duncan. Macbeth and Lennox rush into the chamber where, offstage, Macbeth impulsively kills Duncan's servants to prevent them from professing their innocence. He reappears and confesses to the other nobles that he has killed the servants, but lies that his intentions were to avenge the king's murder. Duncan's two sons flee the country, fearing that they will be killed next. Macduff explains that their flight makes them the main suspects in the king's death, and Macbeth, as Duncan's next of kin, assumes the throne offstage as the new King of Scotland. Banquo remembers the witches' prophecy about how his own descendants would inherit the throne, and he is suspicious that Macbeth might be Duncan's true killer.

Despite Macbeth's success, he remains uneasy about Banquo's role in the prophecy. Inviting Banquo to a royal banquet, Macbeth discovers that Banquo and his young son Fleance will be riding out that night. Macbeth rapidly arranges to have Banquo and Fleance killed, hiring two men and later adding a third murderer to the plan. During the ambush, the murderers succeed in killing Banquo, but Fleance escapes. Macbeth is furious that an heir of Banquo remains alive.

At the banquet, Macbeth has invited his lords and Lady Macbeth to a night of drinking and merriment, though Macduff has refused to come. Banquo's ghost enters and sits in Macbeth's place. Macbeth raves fearfully, startling his guests, as the ghost is visible only to him. The others panic at the sight of Macbeth raging at an empty chair, until a desperate Lady Macbeth lies that her husband is merely afflicted with a harmless lifelong illness. The ghost departs and returns once more, causing the same riotous anger and fear in Macbeth. This time, Lady Macbeth demands that the visitors leave. Elsewhere, Hecate, queen of witchcraft, scolds the three witches for communicating with Macbeth without consulting her. Hecate instructs the witches to next give Macbeth a false sense of safety and overconfidence about his new position.^[c] Through verbal irony, Lennox reveals to another lord his suspicions that Macbeth is a murdering tyrant and they discuss how Macduff, refusing to attend Macbeth's banquet, has gone to England to find allies who will help take back the Scottish throne.

Macbeth visits the three witches and asks them to reveal the truth of their prophecies to him. They summon horrible apparitions, each of which offers further supernatural pronouncements. First, they conjure an armoured head, which tells him to beware of Macduff (IV.i.72). Second, a bloody child tells him that no one born of a woman will be able to harm him. Thirdly, a crowned child holding a tree states that Macbeth will be safe until Great Birnam Wood comes to Dunsinane Hill. Macbeth is relieved because he knows that all his enemies are born of women and a forest cannot possibly travel across the land. However, the witches also conjure a procession of eight crowned kings, the last carrying a mirror that reflects even more kings, and finally the ghost of Banquo pointing to the procession. Macbeth realises nervously that these are all Banquo's descendants who will acquire kingships in numerous countries.

In light of the latest prophecies, Macbeth orders the disobedient Macduff's castle seized and sends assassins to slaughter all its inhabitants, including Macduff's wife and young son. Meanwhile, Macduff himself is in England meeting with Prince Malcolm (the elder of King Duncan's sons) to discuss Macbeth's tyrannical regime. Malcolm, who must be cautious for any traps, confesses that he would be a terrible leader if the crown were handed to him, but this is merely a lie to see how Macduff will react. Macduff shows that he is more loyal to Scotland than any particular leader, impressing Malcolm, who now reveals the lie and says Macduff has won his trust. The Thane of Ross arrives to deliver the horrible news to Macduff that his "castle is surprised, your wife and babes / Savagely slaughter'd" (IV.iii.204–205). With this news of his family's murders, Macduff is stricken with grief, but he is quickly provoked to vengeance by Malcolm who explains that he has raised an army with the help of the English King Edward. Together, they can defeat Macbeth and take back the Scottish throne.

At night, in the royal palace at Dunsinane, a doctor and a gentlewoman discuss Lady Macbeth's sudden frightening habit of sleepwalking. Lady Macbeth enters in a trance, bemoaning the recent murders and trying to wash off imaginary bloodstains from her hands. Her observers marvel at her guilt-ridden confessions. Meanwhile, Prince Malcolm's allied forces plan to join up at Birnam Wood, additionally supported by Macduff and defecting Scottish thanes alarmed by Macbeth's recent barbarities. While encamped in Birnam Wood, Malcolm orders his soldiers to cut down and carry tree boughs to camouflage their numbers.

As Macbeth readies for the attack, he receives news that his wife has suddenly died, causing him to deliver a despairing "Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow" soliloquy (V.v.17–28). Still, he is emboldened by the witches' seeming guarantee of his invincibility against any "man of woman born", until a servant reports that Malcolm's army is advancing on Dunsinane in the form of moving trees. As the invaders take his castle, Macbeth is confronted by Macduff. Macbeth tells him that he cannot be defeated by "one of woman born", but Macduff reveals that he was born by Caesarean section and thus did not have a natural childbirth. In the ensuing duel with Macduff, Macbeth is killed offstage. Macduff reenters with Macbeth's severed head, and Malcolm discusses how order has been restored. He implies that Lady Macbeth's death was a suicide, declares his benevolent intentions for the country, promotes his thanes to earls, and invites all to see him crowned at Scone.

Al menos desde los tiempos de Samuel Johnson , el análisis de la obra se ha centrado en la cuestión de la ambición de Macbeth, comúnmente vista como un rasgo tan dominante que define al personaje. ^{[ 49 ]} Johnson afirmó que Macbeth, aunque estimado por su valentía militar, es totalmente vilipendiado por el lector. ^{[ 50 ]}

Esta opinión se repite en la crítica literaria, sobre todo en la obra de A. C. Bradley , quien analiza a Macbeth como un personaje con coraje y ambición, pero también con la «imaginación de un poeta». Para Bradley, la imaginación de Macbeth es fundamental para su personaje, ya que imagina las consecuencias de su propia ambición y los fantasmas de su culpa con el «éxtasis de un poeta». ^{[ 51 ]}

Additionally, an emphasis on character exists in the work of Caroline Spurgeon, who highlights the way Shakespeare uses the imagery of clothing to characterize his tragic hero. Spurgeon calls attention to how Macbeth is often described as wearing garments that either seem too big or too small for him, as his ambition is too big and his character too small for his new and unrightful role as king. After Macbeth is unexpectedly greeted with his new title as Thane of Cawdor as prophesied by the witches, Banquo comments:

New honours come upon him, Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould, But with the aid of use

And, at the end, when the tyrant is at bay at Dunsinane, Caithness sees him as a man trying in vain to fasten a large garment on him with too small a belt:

He cannot buckle his distemper'd cause Within the belt of rule

while Angus sums up what everybody thinks ever since Macbeth's accession to power:

now does he feel his title Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe upon a dwarfish thief

Like Richard III, but without that character's perversely appealing exuberance, Macbeth wades through blood until his inevitable fall. As Kenneth Muir writes, "Macbeth has not a predisposition to murder; he has merely an inordinate ambition that makes murder itself seem to be a lesser evil than failure to achieve the crown."^[53] Some critics, such as E. E. Stoll, explain this characterisation as a holdover from Senecan or medieval tradition. Shakespeare's audience, in this view, expected villains to be wholly bad, and Senecan style, far from prohibiting a villainous protagonist, all but demanded it.^[47]

Yet for other critics, it has not been so easy to resolve the question of Macbeth's motivation. Robert Bridges, for instance, perceived a paradox: a character able to express such convincing horror before Duncan's murder would likely be incapable of committing the crime.^[54] For many critics, Macbeth's motivations in the first act appear vague and insufficient. John Dover Wilson hypothesised that Shakespeare's original text had an extra scene or scenes where husband and wife discussed their plans. This interpretation is not fully provable; however, the motivating role of ambition for Macbeth is universally recognised. The evil actions motivated by his ambition seem to trap him in a cycle of increasing evil, as Macbeth himself recognises:

I am in blood Stepp'd in so far that, should I wade no more, Returning were as tedious as go o'er.

While working on Russian translations of Shakespeare's works, Boris Pasternak compared Macbeth to Raskolnikov, the protagonist of Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Pasternak argues that "neither Macbeth or Raskolnikov is a born criminal or a villain by nature. They are turned into criminals by faulty rationalizations, by deductions from false premises." He goes on to argue that Lady Macbeth is "feminine ... one of those active, insistent wives" who becomes her husband's "executive, more resolute and consistent than he is himself". According to Pasternak, she is only helping Macbeth carry out his own wishes, to her own detriment.^[55]

The disastrous consequences of Macbeth's ambition are not limited to him. Almost from the moment of the murder, the play depicts Scotland as a land shaken by inversions of the natural order. Shakespeare may have intended a reference to the great chain of being, although the play's images of disorder are mostly not specific enough to support detailed intellectual readings. The play was meant to be performed specifically for King James,^[56] whose belief in the divine right of kings suggests that the tragedy of Macbeth is distinctly moral. The King's own Daemonologie is believed to have inspired the structure of the witches' coven,^[57] making the supernatural world of Macbeth an inversion of the natural kingship, in which he struggles. As in Julius Caesar, though, perturbations in the political sphere are echoed and even amplified by events in the material world. Among the most often depicted of the inversions of the natural order is sleep. Macbeth's announcement that he has "murdered sleep" is figuratively mirrored in Lady Macbeth's sleepwalking.

Macbeth's generally accepted indebtedness to medieval tragedy is often seen as significant in the play's treatment of moral order. Glynne Wickham connects the play, through the Porter, to a mystery play on the harrowing of hell.^[58] Howard Felperin argues that the play has a more complex attitude toward "orthodox Christian tragedy" than is often admitted; he sees a kinship between the play and the tyrant plays within the medieval liturgical drama.^[59]

Some modern queer readings of Macbeth are concerned with the play's themes of "linearity, temporality, and succession," rather than transgressive sexuality.^[60] Lady Macbeth's request that the spirits she calls on "unsex" her is read by Madhavi Menon as indicative of sinthomosexual drive, and queer anti-maternity.^[60] The theme of androgyny is often seen as a special aspect of the theme of disorder, with feminist critic Dympna Callaghan arguing that Duncan's corpse stands in for both Macbeth and Lady Macbeth's "gender indeterminacy".^[61] Macbeth also plays with the inversion of normative gender roles, most famously in the case of the witches (and with Lady Macbeth as she appears in the first act). Whatever Shakespeare's degree of sympathy with such inversions, the play ends with a thorough return to normative gender values. Some feminist psychoanalytic critics, such as Janet Adelman, have connected the play's treatment of gender roles to its larger theme of inverted natural order, as expressed through the "malignant maternal power" of the witches and Lady Macbeth.^[62] Macbeth is punished for his violation of the moral order by being removed from the cycles of nature (which are figured as female); nature itself (as embodied in the movement of Birnam Wood) is part of the restoration of moral order.

Critics in the early twentieth century reacted against what they saw as an excessive dependence on the study of character in criticism of the play. This dependence, though most closely associated with A. C. Bradley, is clear as early as the time of Mary Cowden Clarke, who offered precise, if fanciful, accounts of the predramatic lives of Shakespeare's female leads. She suggested, for instance, that the child Lady Macbeth refers to in the first act died during a foolish military action.^[63]

En respuesta a lo que percibía como una preocupante tendencia entre los críticos a tratar a los personajes de Shakespeare como personas reales, L. C. Knights escribió "¿Cuántos hijos tuvo Lady Macbeth?", donde argumentaba que "una obra de Shakespeare es un poema dramático" y que los críticos deberían hacer mayor hincapié en cómo funciona el lenguaje en la obra. ^{[ 64 ]} En el ensayo cita a G. Wilson Knight, quien argumentaba de manera similar que "las personas, en última instancia, no son humanas en absoluto, sino meros símbolos de una visión poética". ^{[ 65 ]} Bajo esta perspectiva analítica, la invocación que hace Lady Macbeth de un niño al que ha "amamantado" interactúa con otras imágenes de bebés en la obra, como las apariciones del Acto 4. ^{[ 64 ]}

Las tres "hermanas extrañas" abren la obra y han sido objeto frecuente de interpretación. ^{[ 66 ]} Algunos, como Peter Stallybrass ^{[ 67 ]} y Diane Purkiss ^{[ 68 ]} se centran en la comprensión histórica de la brujería, y otros, como Janet Adelman ^{[ 69 ]} y Stephen Greenblatt , ^{[ 70 ]} se centran más en el simbolismo psicológico o cultural.

El rey Jacobo I, mecenas de la compañía teatral de Shakespeare, The King's Men, tenía un interés bien documentado en la brujería. Creía ser víctima de un complot de asesinato relacionado con la brujería ^{[ 68 ]} y escribió una disertación sobre brujería titulada Daemonologie , publicada por primera vez en 1597. A menudo se ha sugerido que el interés del rey en la brujería, junto con el interés popular general que generó, inspiró la inclusión de las tres brujas en la obra. ^{[ 71 ]}

Diane Purkiss, historiadora de la brujería, ha señalado que Shakespeare se inspiró en muchas tradiciones de brujería diferentes, afirmando que "las brujas de Macbeth son un collage de bajo presupuesto, francamente explotador, de fragmentos de sabiduría sobre brujería elegidos al azar, seleccionados no por su significado temático sino por su valor sensacionalista". ^{[ 68 ]}

Otros críticos, como Greenblatt, sostienen que las brujas sí tienen un significado temático. Argumenta que «tanto el teatro como la brujería se construyen en la frontera entre la fantasía y la realidad, el límite o membrana donde se encuentran la imaginación y el mundo corpóreo, la figura y la realidad, la perturbación psíquica y la verdad objetiva». ^{[ 70 ]}

Las brujas introducen ambigüedad en la obra. Comienzan con frases como «Cuando la batalla está perdida y ganada» ^{[ 72 ]} y terminan la primera escena diciendo «lo bello es feo y lo feo es bello / Flotan entre la niebla y el aire fétido» ^{[ 73 ].} Esta ambigüedad, arraigada en frases y lenguaje paradójicos, también puede considerarse de significado temático. Stephen Orgel sostiene que las brujas «viven fuera del orden social, pero encarnan sus contradicciones: bajo la apariencia de la mujer también hay un hombre; bajo la apariencia del hombre también hay una mujer; la naturaleza está llena de demandas contrapuestas, no ordenadas ni jerárquicas, sino profundamente anárquicas» ^{[ 74 ] .}

En la obra, las Tres Brujas representan la oscuridad, el caos y el conflicto, mientras que su papel es el de agentes y testigos. ^{[ 75 ]} Su presencia comunica traición y fatalidad inminente. En la época de Shakespeare, las brujas eran vistas como peores que los rebeldes, "las traidoras y rebeldes más notorias que puedan existir". ^{[ 76 ]} No solo eran traidoras políticas, sino también espirituales. Gran parte de la confusión que surge de ellas proviene de su capacidad para transitar entre la realidad y lo sobrenatural en la obra. Están tan profundamente arraigadas en ambos mundos que no está claro si controlan el destino o si son simplemente sus agentes. ^{[ 70 ]} Desafían la lógica, al no estar sujetas a las reglas del mundo real. ^{[ 77 ]} Se suele decir que las líneas de las brujas en el primer acto: "Lo bello es feo, y lo feo es bello: flota a través de la niebla y el aire inmundo" establecen el tono del resto de la obra al crear una sensación de confusión. En efecto, la obra está repleta de situaciones donde el mal se representa como bien, mientras que el bien se convierte en mal. La frase «Doble, doble trabajo y problemas» comunica claramente la intención de las brujas: solo buscan problemas para los mortales que las rodean. ^{[ 78 ]} Los hechizos de las brujas son notablemente similares a los de la bruja Medusa en la obra Fidele y Fortunio de Anthony Munday, publicada en 1584, y es posible que Shakespeare se haya visto influenciado por ellos.

While the witches do not tell Macbeth directly to kill King Duncan, they use a subtle form of temptation when they tell Macbeth that he is destined to be king. By placing this thought in his mind, they effectively guide him on the path to his own destruction. This follows the pattern of temptation used at the time of Shakespeare. First, they argued, a thought is put in a man's mind, then the person may either indulge in the thought or reject it. Macbeth indulges in it, while Banquo rejects it.^[78]

According to J. A. Bryant Jr., Macbeth also makes use of Biblical parallels, notably between King Duncan's murder and the murder of Christ:

No matter how one looks at it, whether as history or as tragedy, Macbeth is distinctively Christian. One may simply count the Biblical allusions as Richmond Noble has done; one may go further and study the parallels between Shakespeare's story and the Old Testament stories of Saul and Jezebel as Miss Jane H. Jack has done; or one may examine with W. C. Curry the progressive degeneration of Macbeth from the point of view of medieval theology.^[79]

The only eyewitness account of Macbeth in Shakespeare's lifetime was recorded by Simon Forman, who saw a performance at the Globe on 20 April 1610.^[87][88] Scholars have noted discrepancies between Forman's account and the play as it appears in the Folio. For example, he makes no mention of the apparition scene, or of Hecate,^[89] of the man not of woman born, or of Birnam Wood.^[3][87] However, Clark^[90] observes that Forman's accounts were often inaccurate and incomplete (for instance omitting the statue scene from The Winter's Tale) and his interest did not seem to be in "giving full accounts of the productions".^[89]

As mentioned above, the Folio text is thought by some to be an alteration of the original play. This has led to the theory that the play in the Folio was an adaptation for indoor performance at the Blackfriars Theatre (which was operated by the King's Men from 1608) – and even speculation that it represents a specific performance before King James.^[91][92][93] The play contains more musical cues than any other play in the canon as well as a significant use of sound effects.^[94]

Todos los teatros fueron clausurados por el gobierno puritano el 6 de septiembre de 1642. Tras la restauración de la monarquía en 1660, se establecieron dos compañías de teatro (la Compañía del Rey y la Compañía del Duque ), y el repertorio teatral existente se dividió entre ellas. ^{[ 96 ]} Sir William Davenant , fundador de la Compañía del Duque, adaptó la obra de Shakespeare a los gustos de la nueva época, y su versión dominaría los escenarios durante unos ochenta años. Entre los cambios que introdujo se encuentran la ampliación del papel de las brujas, la incorporación de nuevas canciones, bailes y escenas de vuelo, y la ampliación del papel de Lady Macduff como contrapunto de Lady Macbeth. ^{[ 97 ]} Sin embargo, hubo representaciones fuera de las compañías de teatro: entre las formas de eludir el monopolio de la Compañía del Duque se encontraba una versión de Macbeth con marionetas . ^{[ 98 ]}

Macbeth era una de las obras favoritas del diarista del siglo XVII Samuel Pepys , quien la vio el 5 de noviembre de 1664 ("interpretada admirablemente"), el 28 de diciembre de 1666 ("interpretada de manera excelente"), diez días después, el 7 de enero de 1667 ("aunque la vi hace poco, me parece una obra excelente en todos los aspectos"), el 19 de abril de 1667 ("una de las mejores obras de teatro que he visto"), de nuevo el 16 de octubre de 1667 ("me molestó ver a Young, que no es más que un mal actor, en el mejor de los casos, interpretar a Macbeth en lugar de Betterton , ¡que, pobre hombre, está enfermo!"), y de nuevo tres semanas después, el 6 de noviembre de 1667 ("[en] Macbeth , que todavía nos gusta mucho"), una vez más el 12 de agosto de 1668 ("vimos Macbeth , para nuestra gran satisfacción"), y finalmente el 21 de diciembre de 1668, fecha en la que el rey y el tribunal también estaban presentes entre el público. ^{[ 99 ]}

Las primeras representaciones profesionales de Macbeth en Norteamérica fueron probablemente las de The Hallam Company . ^{[ 100 ]}

In 1744, David Garrick revived the play, abandoning Davenant's version and instead advertising it "as written by Shakespeare". In fact this claim was largely false: he retained much of Davenant's more popular business for the witches, and himself wrote a lengthy death speech for Macbeth. And he cut more than 10% of Shakespeare's play, including the drunken porter, the murder of Lady Macduff's son, and Malcolm's testing of Macduff.^[101]Hannah Pritchard was his greatest stage partner, having her premiere as his Lady Macbeth in 1747. He would later drop the play from his repertoire upon her retirement from the stage.^[102] Mrs. Pritchard was the first actress to achieve acclaim in the role of Lady Macbeth – at least partly due to the removal of Davenant's material, which made irrelevant moral contrasts with Lady Macduff.^[103] Garrick's portrayal focused on the inner life of the character, endowing him with an innocence vacillating between good and evil, and betrayed by outside influences. He portrayed a man capable of observing himself, as if a part of him remained untouched by what he had done, the play moulding him into a man of sensibility, rather than him descending into a tyrant.^[104]

John Philip Kemble first played Macbeth in 1778.^[105] Although usually regarded as the antithesis of Garrick, Kemble nevertheless refined aspects of Garrick's portrayal into his own.^[106] However it was the "towering and majestic" Sarah Siddons (Kemble's sister) who became a legend in the role of Lady Macbeth.^[107][108] In contrast to Hannah Pritchard's savage, demonic portrayal, Siddons' Lady Macbeth, while terrifying, was nevertheless – in the scenes in which she expresses her regret and remorse – tenderly human.^[109] And in portraying her actions as done out of love for her husband, Siddons deflected from him some of the moral responsibility for the play's carnage.^[105] Audiences seem to have found the sleepwalking scene particularly mesmerising: Hazlitt said of it that "all her gestures were involuntary and mechanical ... She glided on and off the stage almost like an apparition."^[110]

In 1794, Kemble dispensed with the ghost of Banquo altogether, allowing the audience to see Macbeth's reaction as his wife and guests see it, and relying upon the fact that the play was so well known that his audience would already be aware that a ghost enters at that point.^[111]

Ferdinand Fleck, notable as the first German actor to present Shakespeare's tragic roles in their fullness, played Macbeth at the Berlin National Theatre from 1787. Unlike his English counterparts, he portrayed the character as achieving his stature after the murder of Duncan, growing in presence and confidence: thereby enabling stark contrasts, such as in the banquet scene, which he ended babbling like a child.^[112]

Performances outside the patent theatres were instrumental in bringing the monopoly to an end. Robert Elliston, for example, produced a popular adaptation of Macbeth in 1809 at the Royal Circus described in its publicity as "this matchless piece of pantomimic and choral performance", which circumvented the illegality of speaking Shakespeare's words through mimed action, singing, and doggerel verse written by J. C. Cross.^[114][115]

In 1809, in an unsuccessful attempt to take Covent Garden upmarket, Kemble installed private boxes, increasing admission prices to pay for the improvements. The inaugural run at the newly renovated theatre was Macbeth, which was disrupted for over two months with cries of "Old prices!" and "No private boxes!" until Kemble capitulated to the protestors' demands.^[116]

Edmund Kean, en Drury Lane, ofreció una interpretación psicológica del personaje principal, con un toque popular, pero finalmente no logró el éxito en el papel. Sin embargo, allanó el camino para la interpretación más aclamada del siglo XIX, la de William Charles Macready. Macready interpretó el papel durante 30 años, primero en Covent Garden en 1820 y finalmente en su última función. Si bien su interpretación evolucionó con el tiempo, siempre se destacó por la tensión entre los aspectos idealistas y los aspectos más débiles y venales del personaje de Macbeth. Su puesta en escena estaba llena de espectacularidad, incluyendo varias procesiones reales elaboradas. ^{[ 117 ]}

En 1843, la Ley de Regulación de Teatros puso fin al monopolio de las compañías de patentes. ^{[ 118 ]} Desde entonces hasta el final de la era victoriana , el teatro londinense estuvo dominado por los actores-directores , y el estilo de presentación era "pictórico"  : escenarios de proscenio llenos de espectaculares cuadros escénicos, a menudo con decorados complejos, grandes elencos con elaborados vestuarios y el uso frecuente de cuadros vivientes . ^{[ 119 ] [ 120 ]} Charles Kean (hijo de Edmund), en el Princess's Theatre de Londres de 1850 a 1859, adoptó una visión anticuaria de la representación de Shakespeare, ambientando su Macbeth en una Escocia del siglo XI históricamente precisa. ^{[ 121 ]} Su protagonista femenina, Ellen Tree , creó una sensación de la vida interior del personaje: el crítico de The Times dijo: «El semblante que ella adoptó... al atraer a Macbeth en el curso de su crimen, era realmente espantoso en intensidad, como si denotara un hambre de culpa». ^{[ 122 ]} Al mismo tiempo, los efectos especiales se estaban volviendo populares: por ejemplo, en el Macbeth de Samuel Phelps , las brujas actuaban detrás de una gasa verde , lo que les permitía aparecer y desaparecer usando la iluminación del escenario. ^{[ 123 ]}

In 1849, rival performances of the play sparked the Astor Place riot in Manhattan. The popular American actor Edwin Forrest, whose Macbeth was said to be like "the ferocious chief of a barbarous tribe"^[124] played the central role at the Broadway Theatre to popular acclaim, while the "cerebral and patrician"^[116] English actor Macready, playing the same role at the Astor Place Opera House, suffered constant heckling. The existing enmity between the two men (Forrest had openly hissed Macready at a recent performance of Hamlet in Britain) was taken up by Forrest's supporters – formed from the working class and lower middle class and anti-British agitators, keen to attack the upper-class pro-British patrons of the Opera House and the colonially minded Macready. Nevertheless, Macready performed the role again three days later to a packed house while an angry mob gathered outside. The militia tasked with controlling the situation fired into the mob. In total, 31 rioters were killed and over 100 injured.^{[116][125][126][127]}

Charlotte Cushman is unique among nineteenth-century interpreters of Shakespeare in achieving stardom in roles of both genders. Her New York debut was as Lady Macbeth in 1836, and she would later be admired in London in the same role in the mid-1840s.^[128][129]Helen Faucit was considered the embodiment of early-Victorian notions of femininity. But for this reason she largely failed when she eventually played Lady Macbeth in 1864: her serious attempt to embody the coarser aspects of Lady Macbeth's character jarred harshly with her public image.^[130]Adelaide Ristori, the great Italian actress, brought her Lady Macbeth to London in 1863 in Italian, and again in 1873 in an English translation cut in such a way as to be, in effect, Lady Macbeth's tragedy.^[131]

Henry Irving was the most successful of the late-Victorian actor-managers, but his Macbeth failed to curry favour with audiences. His desire for psychological credibility reduced certain aspects of the role: He described Macbeth as a brave soldier but a moral coward, and played him untroubled by conscience – clearly already contemplating the murder of Duncan before his encounter with the witches.^[132][e] Irving's leading lady was Ellen Terry, but her Lady Macbeth was unsuccessful with the public, for whom a century of performances influenced by Sarah Siddons had created expectations at odds with Terry's conception of the role.^[134][135]

Late nineteenth-century European Macbeths aimed for heroic stature, but at the expense of subtlety: Tommaso Salvini in Italy and Adalbert Matkowsky in Germany were said to inspire awe, but elicited little pity.^[135]

Two developments changed the nature of Macbeth performance in the 20th century: first, developments in the craft of acting itself, especially the ideas of Stanislavski and Brecht; and second, the rise of the dictator as a political icon. The latter has not always assisted the performance: it is difficult to sympathise with a Macbeth based on Hitler, Stalin, or Idi Amin.^[137]

Barry Jackson, at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre in 1923, was the first of the 20th-century directors to costume Macbeth in modern dress.^[138]

En 1936, una década antes de su adaptación cinematográfica de la obra, Orson Welles dirigió Macbeth para la Unidad de Teatro Negro del Proyecto Federal de Teatro en el Teatro Lafayette de Harlem, utilizando actores negros y ambientando la acción en Haití: con tambores y ritos vudú para representar las escenas de las brujas. La producción, apodada El Macbeth vudú , resultó polémica tras los disturbios de Harlem , acusada de burlarse de la cultura negra y de ser "una campaña para ridiculizar a los negros" hasta que Welles convenció al público de que su uso de actores negros y vudú constituía una importante declaración cultural. ^{[ 139 ] [ 140 ]}

Una representación que se cita con frecuencia como ejemplo de la maldición de la obra fue la producción al aire libre dirigida por Burgess Meredith en 1953 en la colonia británica de Bermudas , protagonizada por Charlton Heston . Utilizando el imponente espectáculo del Fuerte Santa Catalina como elemento clave de la escenografía, la producción estuvo plagada de una serie de percances, incluyendo quemaduras a Charlton Heston cuando sus mallas se incendiaron. ^{[ 141 ] [ 142 ]}

Algunos críticos sostienen que hubo tres grandes Macbeths en los escenarios de habla inglesa en el siglo XX, todos ellos comenzando en Stratford-upon-Avon : Laurence Olivier en 1955, Ian McKellen en 1976 y Antony Sher en 1999. ^{[ 143 ]} La interpretación de Olivier (dirigida por Glen Byam Shaw , con Vivien Leigh como Lady Macbeth) fue aclamada de inmediato como una obra maestra. Kenneth Tynan dijo que tuvo éxito porque Olivier construyó el papel hasta un clímax al final de la obra, mientras que la mayoría de los actores gastan todo lo que tienen en los dos primeros actos. ^{[ 137 ] [ 144 ]}

La obra causó dificultades a la Royal Shakespeare Company , especialmente en el (entonces) Shakespeare Memorial Theatre . La producción de Peter Hall de 1967 fue (en palabras de Michael Billington) "un desastre reconocido", con el uso de hojas reales del bosque de Birnham que provocó risas en la noche del estreno, y la producción de Trevor Nunn de 1974 fue (de nuevo Billington) "un espectáculo religioso excesivamente elaborado". ^{[ 145 ]}

But Nunn achieved success for the RSC in his 1976 production at the intimate Other Place, with Ian McKellen and Judi Dench in the central roles.^[146] A small cast worked within a simple circle, and McKellen's Macbeth had nothing noble or likeable about him, being a manipulator in a world of manipulative characters. They were a young couple, physically passionate, "not monsters but recognisable human beings",^[f] but their relationship atrophied as the action progressed.^[148][147]

The RSC again achieved critical success in Gregory Doran's 1999 production at The Swan, with Antony Sher and Harriet Walter in the central roles, once again demonstrating the suitability of the play for smaller venues.^[149][150] Doran's witches spoke their lines to a theatre in absolute darkness, and the opening visual image was the entrance of Macbeth and Banquo in the berets and fatigues of modern warfare, carried on the shoulders of triumphant troops.^[150] In contrast to Nunn, Doran presented a world in which king Duncan and his soldiers were ultimately benign and honest, heightening the deviance of Macbeth (who seems genuinely surprised by the witches' prophecies) and Lady Macbeth in plotting to kill the king. The play said little about politics, instead powerfully presenting its central characters' psychological collapse.^[151]

Macbeth returned to the RSC in 2018, when Christopher Eccleston played the title role, with Niamh Cusack as his wife, Lady Macbeth.^[152] The play later transferred to the Barbican in London.

In Soviet-controlled Prague in 1977, faced with the illegality of working in theatres, Pavel Kohout adapted Macbeth into a 75-minute abridgement for five actors, suitable for "bringing a show in a suitcase to people's homes".^[153][g]

Spectacle was unfashionable in Western theatre throughout the 20th century. In East Asia, however, spectacular productions have achieved great success, including Yukio Ninagawa's 1980 production with Masane Tsukayama as Macbeth, set in the 16th century Japanese Civil War.^[154] The same director's tour of London in 1987 was widely praised by critics, even though (like most of their audience) they were unable to understand the significance of Macbeth's gestures, the huge Buddhist altar dominating the set, or the petals falling from the cherry trees.^[155]

Xu Xiaozhong's 1980 Central Academy of Drama production in Beijing made every effort to be unpolitical (necessary in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution): yet audiences still perceived correspondences between the central character (whom the director had actually modelled on Louis Napoleon) and Mao Zedong.^[156] Shakespeare has often been adapted to indigenous theatre traditions, for example the Kunju Macbeth of Huang Zuolin performed at the inaugural Chinese Shakespeare Festival of 1986.^[157] Similarly, B. V. Karanth's Barnam Vana of 1979 had adapted Macbeth to the Yakshagana tradition of Karnataka, India.^[158] In 1997, Lokendra Arambam created Stage of Blood, merging a range of martial arts, dance and gymnastic styles from Manipur, performed in Imphal and in England. The stage was literally a raft on a lake.^[159]

Throne of Blood (蜘蛛巣城 Kumonosu-jō, Spider Web Castle) is a 1957 Japanese samurai film co-written and directed by Akira Kurosawa. The film transposes Macbeth from Medieval Scotland to feudal Japan, with stylistic elements drawn from Noh drama. Kurosawa was a fan of the play and planned his own adaptation for several years, postponing it after learning of Orson Welles' Macbeth (1948). The film won two Mainichi Film Awards.

The play has been translated and performed in various languages in different parts of the world, and Media Artists was the first to stage its Punjabi adaptation in India. The adaptation by Balram and the play directed by Samuel John have been universally acknowledged as a milestone in Punjabi theatre.^[160] The unique attempt involved trained theatre experts and the actors taken from a rural background in Punjab. Punjabi folk music imbued the play with the native ethos as the Scottish setting of Shakespeare's play was transposed into a Punjabi milieu.^[161]

In 2021, Saoirse Ronan starred in The Tragedy of Macbeth at the Almeida Theatre in London.^[162] The following year a revival production opened on Broadway with Daniel Craig and Ruth Negga to middling reviews.^[163]

A new production starring David Tennant and Cush Jumbo ran at London's Donmar Warehouse from 8 December 2023 to 10 February 2024. Max Webster directed the production.^[164] The show received 3 Laurence Olivier Award nominations, including Best Revival.^[165] It transferred to the Harold Pinter Theatre in the West End from 1 October 2024 for a limited run.^[166]

Macbeth was adapted into an Italian opera (Macbeth) by composer Giuseppe Verdi and librettist Francesco Maria Piave in 1847 (revised in French in 1865). Ernest Bloch's Macbeth, to a libretto by Edmond Fleg, premiered in Paris in 1910.^[167] An English opera adaptation of the play was created by Lawrance Collingwood in 1927.^[168]

Contemporary opera adaptations include Luke Styles' Macbeth (2015)^[169] and Pascal Dusapin's Macbeth Underworld (2019).^[170]

An indirect adaptation is Dmitri Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (1934), based on the novella of the same name by Nikolai Leskov.