Extracts from Dear Mr Shakespeare: letters to a jobbing playwright by
Simon Reade
February 8th ‘06
Dear William,
I know how much Christopher Marlowe must haunt you; and, in a sense, Macbeth is
your Doctor Faustus.
Only it’s miles better.
All the best,
Sasha Radish
Producer
February 10th ‘06
Dear William
Equivocation is in the ether in Jacobean England and Scotland. It’s what Jesuits do,
equivocate, since their extreme Catholicism forbids them to lie outright.
‘Double, double toil and trouble’ (Ivi) chant the Witches.
Doubleness, as in all your plays crammed with twins and antithesis, has a doublemeaning itself: it is both accumulation and opposing duality.
Your play is crammed full of doubling and redoubling equivocation. Macbeth
vacillates:
‘This supernatural soliciting
Cannot be ill, cannot be good…’(Iiii)
Yours,
Horatio
February 11th ‘06
Dear William
Macbeth deliberately puts himself into a position of spiritual darkness:
‘To know my deed, t’were best not know myself.’ (Iiii)
He ends in light, forced by Macduff into the open, no longer ‘cabin’d, cribbed,
confined’ (IIIiv) in his bunker, but thrust into the new dawn:
‘I ‘gin to be aweary of the sun.’ (Vv)
Life to him is a ‘candle’ which lights
‘
fools
The way to dusty death’ (Vv)
It’s another one of your great tragic roles for our leading actors.
Lady Macbeth began in the light, acting with clarity of purpose, declaring that Duncan
will not see out the night:
‘
O never
Shall sun that morrow see!’ (Iv)
But after they have murdered Duncan, they are unable to tell night from day:
MACBETH
LADY MACBETH
What is the night?
Almost at odds with morning, which is
Which? (IIIiv)
Lady Macbeth ends in harrowing darkness, vulnerable, sleepwalking. She is one of
the most extraordinary, mature women you’re ever written. Who will play her?
Best wishes
Bob Castle
Director
MEMO
February 15th ‘06
From: Horatio, Dramaturg
To: Bob, Director
Re: MACBETH
Bob – Macbeth’s servant Seyton (appropriately named) only comes to him on third
calling (Viii). The cold-blooded efficiency of Malcolm’s new order has his soldiers
responding immediately ‘It shall be done’ (Viii).
Macbeth has no loyal allies, forced to hire Kerns, Irish mercenaries, which
Macdonwald had done in the battle which opens the play. (Kerns generally get a bad
press in Shakespeare’s plays:
‘We must supplant those rough rug-headed Kern
Which live like venom where no venom else
But only they have privilege to live’
(Richard II, Iii)
Ireland, as we know from Essex’s disastrous campaign, is an unruly land. It can’t be
comforting to Malcolm that Ireland is where his brother Donalbain has fled in exile
(Iiiii). Maybe that’s why Malcolm’s final, falsely rhyming couplet is ominous?:
‘So thanks to all at once, and to each one,
Whom we invite to see us crowned at Scone.’ (Vix)
There have been other signals: Malcolm is greeted thrice: ‘Hail!’ (Vix). So was
Macbeth. By the Witches.
Authority may be re-established at the end of the play, but its strength and pedigree
are questionable to say the least. The play never recovers from the evil spell cast
upon it by its opening scene:
‘When shall we three meet again..’ (Ii)
‘What’s done is done’ (IIIii), says Lady Macbeth.
‘What’s done cannot be undone’ (Vi), says Lady Macbeth.
Horatio
February 18th ‘06
Dear William,
THE SCOTTISH PLAY
Were you unnerved making evil so tangible in this play? We’re so superstitious in
the theatre that we won’t call it M****** but The Scottish Play, stepping outside the
dressing room and turning around three times and such like.
We know King James likes plays about witchcraft – and you’ve quickly followed the
success of Marston’s Sophonisbra which presented witchcraft just as disturbingly as
you do in your play. Plus you get Banquo to spell out his legacy:
‘Myself should be the root and father
Of many kings’ (IIIi),
Banquo is James’ ancestor. So this play is going to go down very well in private
performances in Court, as well as in the public playhouse.
Yours,
Luke Strong
Artistic Director & Joint Chief Executive
MEMO
February 28th ‘06
From: Lionel Farthing, Joint CEO
To: Luke Strong, Joint CEO
Re: MACBETH
Luke –
It’s unproduceable! Those witches! That moving wood!
However we could defer the running costs to the new financial year. You’ll
appreciate that we’ve used up all our actor weeks for this year as it is. And what with
the Marlowe retrospective in the autumn and the need to get a satisfactory Christmas
title as an alternative to the panto, we just can’t take big risks on new works. But
you’ll still have to reduce its scale.
Lionel
MEMO
March 1st ‘06
From: Luke
To: Lionel
Re: MACBETH
Lionel – I’m going to ask Thomas Middleton to do a polish – to give us more of the
witch stuff, which (pardon the pun) he’ll take from his own play The Witch. Then we’ll
have a sure-fire box office hit.
Luke
May 5th ‘06
William –
How’s the drinking? Provoking the desire but taking away the performance?
(Porter, Macbeth, Iiiii)
Richy B.