Macbeth in the land 
of remorse

SUITABLE FOR A PUBLIC FROM 14 YEARS OLD

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The plot

Macbeth is a brilliant man, a leader who returns victorious from a battle, receiving honors and applause from his own sovereign. In an excess of ambition, infatuated with good wishes received from unknown fortune-tellers, and supported by his wife Lady Macbeth, Macbeth returns to his castle with the thought that he can really put in place a plan that will make him as soon as possible what he himself would like to become: the ruler of the whole of Scotland. Returning from the war, Macbeth receives the honor of hosting the King of Scotland himself in his palace. In a fluctuating confrontation with Lady Macbeth, he realizes that the only way to get what they both want is to assassinate the king, their host. Never a more useful occasion, Macbeth doubts, hesitates, is infatuated with the thought of obtaining so much power but on the other hand he is not convinced that murder is the most honorable solution to achieve his goals. To make him take courage, and to give him the strength to go all the way to what he wants is his wife Lady M. who informs him about the duty man must take on to achieve the desired results. After having elaborated the plan of the assassination, Macbeth and Lady M. commit the crime, the next day the king's bodyguards are blamed for the assassination, while Macbeth obtained the crown begins to doubt everything and everyone. The king's sons flee with the fear of being next victims, and so do many belonging to the king's circle. But, in the meantime, in Macbeth fear transforms reality into appearance and the supernatural into the true and only visible reality. The willpower of Lady Macbeth herself gives way to the obsession with crime, until she reaches madness. Other deaths follow the assassination of the king, since it is difficult to convince everyone of one's innocence, moreover in Macbeth the initial prophecy echoes with ever greater impetus, in which Macbeth would have been king of Scotland, but would have been killed only by a man "unborn from a mother ". This prophecy pushes him to the point of no return.

The themes

Macbeth is a complex world full of characters.
In this version, the main dichotomy between the magical world and the world of the human is privileged. Within which we have recreated a homegrown setting. Puglia Magica, partly described by E. De Martino, is the setting of our Macbeth: a modern panorama, closer to current events in which the culture of tarantism is flanked by rave parties, where in addition to the numerous beliefs they still hurt, the "backbiting"; where the judgment of some can lead others to make wicked deeds. The settings and musical choices recreate today's Puglia, a region revised from the point of view of trends and youthful fashions, seeking in them a universal and Shakespearean character.
Deception and Prophecy: Macbeth lets himself be deceived by what he wants to understand, he is not satisfied with receiving a "wish" he acts to condition his time and obtain as soon as possible what the witches have for him  promised. Macbeth decides to assassinate the king in force, and in doing so he breaks the firm pact between the natural and the supernatural: Macbeth rejects the promise received from the witches and with his hand he builds his future. In this Macbeth represents man, free will, but also human destiny which cannot fail to pay all the consequences of its actions. The beauty of nature, the Apulian lands, and the Scottish expanses - parallelism through which the Scottish folk tradition and the Apulian folk tradition will be approached - become the pleasant place, the heavenly world in which the beauty of nature is sovereign, in a continuous conflict between natural beauty and city, ruins and olive groves. In this kingdom of nature reside the spirits, presences, rites and traditions linked to agricultural life: the witches, the bonds of love, the promises and the spells, the dances, the lullabies and the gestures that over time have become elements of folklore, or absorbed in some rites still in use in some Apulian centers.

Theater for English

To get closer to English through the theater, we propose to upper secondary school classes a representation of the famous Bardo opera, Macbeth, made by professional native English speakers together with professional Italian actors.

Experience and teaching

The presence of dialogues in Italian will serve to “lead” the spectators into a better understanding of the Shakespearean texts represented in the original language. This pedagogical process, which involves the parallel use of two languages, was designed precisely to enrich the theatrical experience of the students and to limit their possible estrangement from the current show, and is useful for the work to gradually capture all the students: both those who have a better command of the English language and those who are starting to learn it. The duration of the play is about 60 minutes.

At the end of the show, the native speakers of English, flanked by the Italian actors, are available to meet and discuss with the students.