Mr and Mrs Macbeth

Macbeth play’s was written by Shakespeare in 1623

The extract study here is the Act I, scene 5:

      Come, you spirits
   That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,
   And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full
   Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood;
   Stop up the access and passage to remorse,
   That no compunctious visitings of nature
   Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
   The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts,
   And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring ministers,
   Wherever in your sightless substances
   You wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night,
   And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,
   That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,
   Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
   To cry "Hold, hold!"

Many different themes compose the paly: "Mr and Mrs Macbeth". One of the topics tackled by the play is the supernatural, because, for example when we  look at Act I scene V there  is the mention of spirits that “tend on mortals”.  Lines 3-4  refer to ambition because Lady Macbeth said, “And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full…” it clearly shows us that she wants power.

From line 5-11: Lady Macbeth shows her determination to murder King Duncan, she thinks she could commit the murder herself but it is no woman’s business, that’s why she tries to convince her husband, Macbeth, to kill Duncan in the night.

For Shakespeare, women are a  curse for men;  Lady Macbeth manipulates Macbeth, she is the one behind the murder of the King Duncan ,therefore we can say that for Shakespeare, women are not good for men

The play is called “Mr and Mrs Macbeth “instead of “Macbeth” because it focuses on the relationship of the couple .it wants to emphasize the power of Lady Macbeth who manipulates her husband, like a puppet.  

article written by Mosser Romain

Mr and Mrs Macbeth

By Sarah Wasser

This play, written by William Shakespeare is an ambitious and powerful one. This extract  is taken from the fifth scene of the first act, where Mrs Macbeth’s feelings and thoughts are exposed.

“Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full

Of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood.

Stop up the access and passage to remorse,

That no compunctious visitings of nature

Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between

The effect and it! Come to my woman’s breasts,

And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,

Wherever in your sightless substances

You wait on nature’s mischief. Come, thick night,

And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,

Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark

To cry “Hold, hold!”

L1-2, it deals with the supernatural world, L3-4 with ambition, L5-11 with guilt and L11-end with ambition again.

The  first lines refer to the  supernatural because Mrs Macbeth talks about spirits and mortals. “Unsex me here” refers to masculinity and aggression: she says that she wants to be a man.

L3-4, she wants to say “and fill me with direst cruelty from the crown to the toe top”. She wants to be cruel, entirely cruel as she says from the crown (=the head) to the toes. Her behaviour is just as ambitious and cruel as men’s. She wants to be as strong as a man, to have  thick blood, to be brave and powerful and “without feelings”… This was the men’s reputation and image in the 16th and  17^th century.

L5-11, this passage is about Lady Macbeth’s determination to have King Duncan murdered. In fact, she says she wants to have no regret for doing wrong ("doing wrong" here, means killing the king), and she says she doesn’t want any “uneasiness of conscience shake her terrible aim”.She doesn't want to feel guilty, even after her terrible deed.

Lady Macbeth thinks she could commit the murder herself, in fact she says “my keen knife”, “my fell purpose”, “my woman’s breasts”, etc… She wants to do it in the “thick night”, in the “blanket of the dark”. She thinks the ministers are too weak and have a weak personality.

Lady Macbeth manipulated Macbeth into murdering King Duncan because women could not do this sort of things.

According to Shakespeare, men would be in a better and easier life/world if women were not here to make them live terrible situations such as the one Mr Macbeth experiments, in this play.

The play is called “Mr and Mrs Macbeth”, not like the original version, because the stage director only chose extracts of the original version which focused on MrsMacbeth, her personality and her personal ambition.

As in the 17^th century, plays were supposed to give to the people a kind of “moral”, Mrs Macbeth becomes full of remorse and finally crazy at the end of the play.

Mr and Mrs Macbeth, a play of ambition , supernatural and guilt 

 by Louiza Maameri 1°S₁

A glance at an excerpt from Macbeth:

Lady Macbeth

Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full

Of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood.

Stop up the access and passage to remorse,

That no compunctious visitings of nature

Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between

The effect and it! Come to my woman’s breasts,

And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring ministers,

Wherever in your sightless substances

You wait on nature’s mischief. Come, thick night,

And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell,

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes,

Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark

To cry “Hold, hold!

Macbeth, Act I, Scene V

First of all, the play of « Mr. and Mrs. Macbeth » can be described as a play about ambition. Indeed, we can notice repeatedly Mrs. Macbeth's ambition. This character is full of manliness and aggressiveness, she wants to be unsexed. Indeed she asks the spirits to come so as to unsexed her. She also intends to be full of cruelty in order to kill King Duncan without having any remorse and faintness of consciousness. She just acts like a man was supposed to act in the XVII^th century. Her purpose is to murder King Duncan so she can be the Queen and she winds up her husband to get what she wants. She is so ambitious, that she thinks she can commit this murder alone, because according to her, the Ministers and men are only weak creatures. However, she has  to manipulate her husband so that he commits the murder of the king, because she cannot do it herself as she would wish to, since she is a woman. She would like to murder the King in a very dark night. And that is, what makes her a monster, full of the  “direst cruelty. Shakespeare really presents women in general as a curse for men, given that Lady Macbeth is represented as a woman without heart and full of ambition, ready for anything to get her way.

The original title of Shakespeare's play is :"Macbeth", unlike this one, which is entitled "Mr. and Mrs. Macbeth", because it focuses on the couple Macbeth and more particularly on Lady Macbeth. It introduces women as being the evil part of the play.

Moreover, this play can be considered as full of  supernatural elements, because we notice the appearance of ghosts. Furthermore, there are prophecies, predictions dictated by witches. As a result, there are several supernatural elements.

Finally, this play is also full of guilt. Indeed, Lady Macbeth commits suicide, because she is filled with guilt for what she made.

To conclude, this ambitious, supernatural play of guilt gives us a morality: you only reap what you sowed.  

Review of « Mr and Mrs Macbeth »

by Maameri Louiza & Zeres Sandra 

On February 18th, 2014, we went to the "Château des Rohan", all dressed up because of Shrove Tuesday,  to see the  play "Mr and Mrs Macbeth" written by William Shakespeare and slightly adapted by Lucille O'Flanagan. This play was an adaptation of the masterpiece "Macbeth" by William Shakespeare. The performance was played by Dominic Gould who played the role of Macbeth, Gala Besson who performed Lady Macbeth and Dan Gutman who played the role of Banquo, Macduff. The other actors were not present on stage but owe ciould see them on a video. Indeed, there was a play and 3D episodes on screen.

The play told the story of a relentless fighter, Macbeth who met three witches. They revealed him his future and his blood froze. By the help of his ambitious wife, Macbeth murdered some servants, some friends and their king Duncan.  Macbeth finally became the king. But came the time of nightmares and regrets because at the end, he only reaped what he sowed… Actually, Macbeth succumbed to the powers of evil and his crimes finally distorted his judgment, poisoned his imagination and left him absolutely isolated and alone.

The performance was a tragedy. It was an all human story of temptation, ambition and greed. I regret that the stage director did not add comic elements. Having read the text before, the play was completely based on Shakespeare’s one. Nothing was new except the 3D screen which was naturally not in the original play of Shakespeare. There was no surprise.

 However the actors were really convincing, they were playing their roles with passion, they spoke loudly enough and articulated every word which made the play easy to understand.

Mr & Mrs Macbeth

Summary

by Eve Speisser and Camille Huppert

At the beginning of the play, there were 2 of King Duncan’s generals (Duncan is the king of Scotland): Macbeth and Banquo. Suddenly, they saw  three witches, who told them a prophecy. They told them that Macbeth would become the  king and thane of Cawdorbut. They also told Banquo that his son would become king too

 Lady Macbeth convinces her husband to kill Duncan. When they hear about that murder, Duncan’s sons, Malcom and Donalbain, flee to England and Ireland.

Macbeth meets the witches again and they tell him a new prophecy, this time they tell him three things:

-          Macduff (who’s a noble man) is opposed to Macbeth’s accession to the throne

-          Macbeth will be  safe until the forest comes to his castle

-          He is safe as long as babies are born of women

The only problem for Macbeth,  is Macduff, so Macbeth kills Macduff’s wife and children while Macduff flees to England. He wants to take revenge on  the murder of his family ,so he raises an army with Malcolm.

As she feels guilty, Lady Macbeth kills herself

The three prophecies of the witches appear to be true:

-          Macduff isn’t born naturally (he wasn’t born out of the womb but by caesarean)

-          The army hides itself with wood, so the forest comes to the castle.

Finally, Macduff and Macbeth fight and Macbeth is beheaded.

Malcolm becomes king of Scotland.

Critique :

by Renan garcia

Mr and Mrs Macbeth :

            The performance was called « Mr and Mrs Macbeth », a play inspired by « Macbeth » written by Shakespeare. The performance took place on Tuesday, February 18th at the « Espace Rohan ». The play was performed by actors of the company « le théâtre en Anglais ». The performance was adapted from Shakespeare’s play by Sam Pinnel and Lucile O’Flannagan.The latter was also the stage director. The performance is a tragedy. The actors portrayed the characters very well but it was kind of « old school », although they were hard to portray because they were realistic and very complex. The characters portrayed « the human nature » in an awesome way, showing aspects of human vanity, selfishness and thirst of power. What happens to them proves that the wheels of the action turn full circle and the villains will get punishment for their deeds. Having read the text before, I think the actors didn’t drift away from the original text but if they did ,I didn’t notice it, so it was greatly done. I was particularly surprised when I saw the 3D glasses and screen.In my opinion, the use of the 3D really matched the acting. However, as far as I am concerned, I don’t really like 3D. I think the acting with a real set and real scenery would have emphasized the actors. The actors should have been better synchronized with the 3D screen and interact a bit more with the audience. On the whole, I would say that the set was a bit bare and plain, the main setting was the 3D screen. However, the 3D screen reflected the creepy atmosphere of the play in a great way, and the lighting was effective. The stage lights added a cinematic touch to the play, it was dark, then illuminated, and it helped the sequence of the scenes.

The costumes varied; from my point of view, it revealed the role of the character and the kind of personality. I did not notice any props apart from the 3D screen, and this screen helped the performance to run smoothly. From my point of view, once again, the only thing that was really complementing the play was the 3D screen, the rest was rather shallow.

On the whole, I would say that the performance was quite interesting but I prefer “classical” plays with no screen, it’s more original, and the acting did not really match the screen (film). During the performance, depending on the action, one could either be interested or bored, because the action was kind of slow; the actors lacked charisma and particularly the ones on the screen. It is very hard to tell how the entire audience responded to the performance, but according to the people that were around me I can say that they reacted in different ways, some were captivated and liked it a lot whereas some just took a nap, and then people like me that had mixed feelings. I would recommend the story (script) “Mr and Mrs Macbeth”, but not particularly this play, if you are someone interested in new ways of acting a play just go watch it but if you like plays with people of “flesh and bones” do not go. As the play was based on “Macbeth” by Shakespeare and having read the text before, the ending was predictable for me, but I think the actors were not good at acting the end, I was kind of disappointed by the end.