Front Row Reviewers Staff
Watching Macbeth in the setting of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in downtown Salt Lake City, one almost feels as though one has stepped into an old Celtic castle. The hallways flicker with lamplight, the rich stone and dark wood touches juxtaposing against serene white. It is the perfect place to see a Shakespearean tragedy, especially one so long-beloved as the Scottish play Macbeth. Directors Megan Chase and Christopher Taylor (who also plays the titular role), seem committed to telling the story in a sincere and straightforward way, with only as many bells and whistles as Shakespeare himself weaved into the piece. The result is exciting, accessible, eerie, and moving.
At very first beat, the witches, played by Tami Anderson, Chase, and Elise Hanson, are delightfully eldritch. They set the otherworldly tone, mincing about in strange lighting (designed by Blayne Wiley), and picking through dead bodies like vultures. Acting sometimes as a unit and sometimes as three separate entities, their presence is a potent one in the play. The physicality of Hansonin particular is electrifying, the actress performing through every part of her body right down to her toes, lurching animalistically and maintaining a ghoulish, probing presence that is both magnetic and terrifying. It is worth noting that Hanson plays several characters in the piece, such as the porter, playing the audience like a fiddle with her “knock knock, who’s there” jokes and making the lines of the Doctor seem so natural and modern it feels like an everyday scene. Her effortless energy onstage and expert use of the language bespeaks a seasoned and well-versed actor, the likes of which can bring color and quality to a piece like this.
Indeed, the amount of talent onstage is something to behold. Meighan Page is gripping as Lady Macbeth, summoning smoldering ferocity and poignant sorrow with deft alacrity. In the scene wherein she rubs imaginary blood from her hands, her fear at the ghosts haunting her, and her regret at the sins she and her husband had committed inspire pity and profound emotion. Chase’s choice to have Lady Macbeth be pregnant adds to the tragedy of the whole thing while strengthening the focus of their ambition, and Page’s performance reflects this. As her counterpart, Taylor is a diffident, cerebral Macbeth, thinking his way through every move and beat until pushed into a fervor by people and forces around him. Taylor plays the reluctance and agony of Macbeth with constraint and intelligence, juxtaposing those moods wonderfully with the moments in which he is absolutely unraveling, as in his terror at seeing the ghost of Banquo, played memorably by Cami Rozanas, whose ghost is perfectly wretched and woeful, and his obsession with the loss of control over his own fate. Taylor is obviously a talented comedian, and his natural gifts shine through in the layers and colors with which he paints his scenes, able to play beats and control the tone of a scene.
Other standouts are Isabella Giordano as Macduff and Trevor Bird and Briana Lindsay Fisher as Ross and Lennox, respectively Giordano’s Macduff is passionate and powerful, and she is engrossing onstage, very easily winning the audience to her side. Bird and Fisher are delightfully saucy together, performing with graceful wit scenes that normally might be forgettable. The pair have perfect chemistry, including a later scene in which Fisher switches to playing Lady Macduff in the harrowing scene in which she and her son (played by Grant Christopherson), lose their lives to an assassin played by Adam McGrath. The actors all know how to make the most of every moment they are onstage, giving forth energy and balance to the moments. The fight choreography by Taylor was gorgeously crafted and finely executed, and the sword fighting scenes, particularly Banquo’s assassination and Macduff’s defeat of Macbeth, are breathtaking.
Macbeth is a thrilling and timeless tale to be sure, and this rendition of the famous piece is a perfect example of why the story holds up. The betrayal of friendship, the ruination of greed, the destructive quality of avarice, and the tragedy of a great, intelligent couple that may have been just a bit too goal-oriented.
New World Shakespeare Company presents Macbeth by William Shakespeare.
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 261 900 E Salt Lake City, UT 84102
February 9-19, 2023 7:30 PM, 3:00 matinees with special Valentine’s Day performance
Tickets: $20
Contact: newworldshakespeare@gmail.com
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