SLEEP NO MORE

Shanghai, 2016 -

The fourth incarnation of Punchdrunk’s reimagining of Macbeth opened in 2016 and is still running today. I was a member of the production’s original cast, tasked with adapting the existing show to a different setting and a new space, under the direction of Conor Doyle and the original creators Maxine Doyle and Felix Barrett. As well as learning existing scenes, I enjoyed the opportunity to create fresh material. I alternated playing Duncan and the Taxidermist, and helped to develop these roles from their counterparts in the even-longer running New York version.

An audience member’s account, extracted from this post on tumblr:

The Shanghai Macbeth is SCARY. Scarier than in New York, more deranged.

[One reason] is Duncan. In New York, Duncan is a symbol. Regal. Distant. I never really care when he dies; my heart doesn’t start to break until Banquo and Lady Macduff.

But in Shanghai, Sam Booth’s Duncan is a stunning reinvention of the character. He’s still a symbol - as every character is - but he’s also human. He’s *specific* and idiosyncratic. He sings to himself, and dreams, and has moods and fears.

He’s terrified not just of his own death but of age, of irrelevance. He’s conflicted towards his son, proud and yet full of dread that Malcolm will one day replace him. He latches on to Lady Macbeth because she makes him feel youthful, alive in the face of the looming death he fears. He’s flawed; he thrills at the prospect of an affair with his host’s wife. 

Sam’s performance highlights the man beneath the regal symbolism of the character. The fragility of his humanity, as he stumbles up the stairs singing, as he struggles to remove his jacket under the influence of the drug. As he dreams of kissing the woman who’s sent him to his death.

He becomes a symbol, not just of "the king,” but of regrets and lost possibilities.