A Play that Rhymes with Heath (Hint: It is Macbeth)

This week we have Macbeth as the show.
What can be said about Macbeth?
An awful lot.
Which is surprising as it is one of his shortest plays.

The count:
Hamlet: 3834 lines
Othello: 3323
Lear: 3216
Macbeth: 2082
source

Of the four great tragedies it is the shortest (beating its closest rival, King Lear, by more than a thousand lines).
For those not in the know, one thousand lines translates to in excess of an hour of real stage time.
Hamlet at four hours.
Lear/Othello at around three.
Macbeth at an itty bitty two (if you are dogging it).

So it goes faaaaaaaaaas--oops, it is done.
Don't blink or you will miss it.

Now, if you have not seen one of the greatest works of English drama.
Go forth. Do that.
For those who do not have time (you do) read it.
For those still quibbling here is the roughest of outlines so we can all be on the same page:
MACBETH
That physically hurt. Here is an actual summary:

1. The play opens with three witches: "When shall we three meet again?" (Already doing something and now they are leaving. What are they doing? Where are they going? we wonder.)
2. "Upon the heath/There to meet with Macbeth" (Prophesying a meeting with the title character)
3. Next, the present king (Duncan) is told of Macbeth and Banquo's bravery, bestowing the title of the treacherous Cawdor upon Macbeth (!)
4. Then, the witches meet Macbeth (their predictions are accurate!). They prophesy him as Thane of Glamis (which he is) Thane of Cawdor (which he already is) and King hereafter.  The thanes arrive and tell him that he is Cawdor (confirming the witches' power for Macbeth).
5. Duncan names his son as successor (in Macbeth's way)
6. Lady M decides to kill Duncan hearing of the witches' prophecy.
7. Macbeth sees a floating dagger that points towards Duncan's sleeping body.
8. Lady M drugs Duncan's guards. Macbeth murders Duncan. Lady M covers up.
9. The following morning Duncan is discovered by Macduff and Macbeth murders the guards in a 'fit' (Macduff suspects).
10. The blame falls on Duncan's successors as they were most immediate to his throne (motive/opportunity). They flee.
11. Macduff does not go to Macbeth's coronation.
12. Macbeth is named king, but fears the accuracy of the witches and enlists murderers to kill Banquo and his son.
13. Banquo is murdered and a great feast is held.
14. The Ghost of Banquo appears before Macbeth and everyone knows he is crazy.
15. Macbeth goes to see the withces once more to determine his next action and whether Macduff is an enemy.
16. The witches confirm his fears and that Banquo will have succession to the throne for generations (bit of propaganda for Shakespeare's patron)
17. Macbeth murders Macduff's entire family.
18. Macduff returns to Scotland with Duncan's successor and an English army.
19. Macbeth is overthrown and beheaded by the virtuous Macduff.
20. Malcolm is seated on the throne and all ends happily.

(Oh and Lady M suicides herself.)

Woo! That was a bit much.
But those are the plot points.
Now this may just look like a wall of text, but it is the major plot points for each scene in Macbeth.
If you hit these, you have told the story.

The point of this post is to describe how quickly everything happens.
Again, this play takes place over ninety minutes.
For anyone who has sat through four hours of Lear/Hamlet you know that brevity really is the most important thing about theatre.

In the first act, the FIRST ACT we see Macbeth commit regicide.
The whole second act deals with the horror of that moment.
By the third Macbeth has everything he could have dreamed of at top of show: love of his wife, praise of his fellows, winning a war, more land, jewels, respect, power, even the kingship.
And yet...it is not enough.
The rest of the play is an unraveling at ever greater speeds of that motif:
Never safe, never enough, never, never, never.

Within the span of an hour and a half play we see a war hero devolve into a homicidal, hallucinating, deranged tyrant.
That is some drama.

But how does Shakespeare do it?
Why do we care?
And how does a theatre maker/audience make it better?
Because that is the trick.
Shakespeare gave a framework; a sturdy one albeit, but nonetheless, a bare framework.
It is our job to flesh it out and give it life.

Next up we will start at the beginning: the witches!