MACBETH, Oddlife Theater Company, at Bailiwick Arts Center, and MACBETH, at Barat College. Any staging of the Scottish tragedy sinks or soars with the Macbeths: despite its tragic sprawl and bloody spectacle, the play belongs entirely to the title tyrant and his instantly corruptible hellmate.
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Oddlife Theater’s staging unfortunately doesn’t trust the text, though this debut production is stalwartly traditional, with a minimal set, the usual Scottish medieval wear, and few cuts (too few). Director Kurt Ehrmann says he intends to explore the evil in Macbeth–which makes David Solovieff’s sporadically soft-spoken delivery a surprising choice. Solovieff plays the character as if Macbeth’s better self refused to abandon his soul; when it finally does, he shrinks where other Macbeths expand. The Hamlet-like result is intermittently intriguing but conveys no urgency, continuity, or chills. Likewise unvarying in volume or approach is Kirsten Fitzgerald’s Lady Macbeth, wrapping every line in portentous gloom. She works overtime to preserve a spell she never cast in the first place.
Oddlife’s Macbeth may be a saga of lost opportunities, but the Barat College production surges with sound and fury and signifies much. (It’s also free.) Karla Koskinen’s handsome open-air staging is as energetically barbaric as Linda Roethke’s warrior costumes, pairing an unrelenting plot with unstoppable action.
