The Company and the Text: Macbeth

A note from Erika Anclade, THST senior and Lady Macbeth: 

Legend has it that Lady Macbeth was actually Shakespeare’s original intended lead for his play, The Tragedy of Macbeth. Given the difficulty of having a young boy as Lady lead such a show, however, the idea was dropped, and the coveted title position was given back to her husband. That being said, her agency and command were not stripped from her; they remain intact and excruciatingly present throughout the play. She is beautiful and strong, feminine and ferocious. She defies the misogynistic ideal of what it means to be a woman, both in her day and age and today. She is not a lady in waiting, standing one step behind her husband. She is a warrior for the play’s subtextual cause of making women the arbiters of change and influence. 

Thus, “The Company and the Text: Macbeth,” directed by Theater Studies professor Deborah Margolin, was born. We want to shift the focus from the murders and the witches and her husband’s hysteria to her journey in the show: her growth and arc, her historic play to take power into the hands of a woman of intelligence and ambition. We want to explore the nuances of Lady Macbeth as a cultural image of female empowerment. 

Questions we will ask include: What does it mean to be a resilient, feminine force in a world of male bias? What is the true cultural, psychological, and historical significance behind her choosing the specific phrase “Unsex me here,” beyond the superficial annotations we see in “No Fear Shakespeare”? What does it mean to be the driving force behind the acceleration of you and your partner’s goals? What does it mean to be so independent yet so passionately intertwined with said partner? What does it mean for me, as the actor, to embody a woman who has so much agency and drive, even for present standards, that it consumes her? 
Classes meet Mondays and Wednesdays from 3:30 PM to 5:20 PM. All are welcome! Please come join us on this collaborative and revolutionary journey rejoicing of what it means to be gloriously woman!