Question

What do modern audience relate to adaptions of Macbeth

Answer 1

Hmmm my very favourite Shakespearian play and I have toured as a techie with this one, so I know it well.

Macbeth is a warm soul, but with ambition. We can all identify with that one. However, when the witches promise him the kingdom, he is amazed that he could get that far and discusses it with his beloved Lady. SHE is the one who manipulates him and changes him.

Inside all of us, we have superstition and ambition. However, he is gullible too and listens to Lady Macbeth ... although he knows it is wrong, she convinces him that murdering the king is the right thing to do. So he does....but panics, that is when we see Lady Mac in her real light, she covers for him and makes certain the deed cannot be traced back to him. She is the real villain here although she later looses her mind due to the weight of what she has done and the fact that she has lost her soul mate.

In doing all this she convinces her husband that he is wonderful and he becomes power mad.... nothing can touch him and his atrocities mount, but there is this nagging guilt that he fights to override at the detriment of his mental health and this marriage.

Eventually he goes mad with guilt and greed for power....and whilst he is convinced the witches warning can never come true...he is so sure of himself, but he gets it wrong.

We all get these things wrong sometimes, we are all talked into things we shouldn’t do, and get it wrong and feel guilty.

Yes, we can all identify and in a strange way sympathize with Macbeth. He was led astray by the witches and his wife...and then once he believed them and was controlled by them, he became truly power hungry.