'Macbeth' review — Shakespeare meets 'Psycho' in this starkly paranoid, boldly deconstructed tragedy

Read our review of Macbeth, starring Alex Austin and Lois Chimimba, now in performances at the Lyric Hammersmith to 29 March.

First staged in 2023, Richard Twyman’s production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth for English Touring Theatre deconstructs the text (dramaturgy by Rikki Henry) with a cut-and-paste approach to scenes and structure. The result is a curious blend of European avant-garde styles and kitchen-sink realism. There are some striking moments but the characters’ motivations remain unclear and the tone is uneven throughout.

It gets off to a rough start as the witches are relegated offstage with their words only related in fragments, so we never get a true sense of what is haunting the title character. Instead, it opens at home where Lady Macbeth is sorrowfully putting away baby clothes and receives the news about her husband’s imminent promotions by voicemail.

Designed by Basia Binkowska with a certain expressionistic/Silent Witness-esque vibe, the action takes place in a domestic space that is far from homely and more akin to a bunker (a place for survival rather than living). A selection of knives are ominously attached to the industrial-sized fridge and there’s a Psycho-style shower in the corner, which contribute effectively to the sense of domestic horror. The use of live video/CCTV heightens the atmosphere of paranoia.

Alex Austin unfortunately seems miscast as a petulant Macbeth who is too young and boyish to be convincing as a successful general. Lois Chimimba is more convincing as his partner-in-crime, being far more shrewd than her weak-willed spouse.

When they’re raised to the status of king and queen, they’re like a pair of minor celebrities high on their self-importance and playing at being royalty. Twyman also effectively shows that they start out as a loving couple who are poisoned by the pursuit of power, as seen in their tender dance to a Louis Armstrong record.

The attempts to break the fourth wall don’t pay off. The Porter hands out some souvenirs and when Macbeth asks if we are enjoying ourselves, he receives a muted response. Two audience members are invited onstage to be guests at the Macbeths’ coronation feast with seemingly no other purpose than to swell the numbers.

Poor diction and sound design don’t help matters, nor does the mishmash of bagpipes and electronic music. Deconstruction can yield fascinating results, but comprehensibility shouldn’t go out of the window. This production has potential to tap into the psychological horror of the story but it needs greater coherence and emotional engagement if not to be reduced to an exercise in an assortment of contemporary theatre styles.

Macbeth is at the Lyric Hammersmith to 29 March. Book Macbeth tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk

Photo credit: Macbeth (Photos by Richard Lakos)