For a play that ends so bloodily, Macbeth starts like an improvisation. It is a tragedy of opportunism, of a moment of hubris that spins out of control. For a while, it could go either way.
That comes across in this staging, directed by Mark Babych in a three-way co-production with Bolton Octagon and Derby theatre. Macbeth strides on, fresh from the battlefield, a modern-day soldier with camouflage colours and an automatic weapon. Played by Oliver Alvin-Wilson, he is as tough as his country needs him to be: serious-minded and professional, but not self-seeking.
The idea he might be more than a regular fighter enters him like a poison. Foretold to him by the witches – mix-and-match eccentrics somewhere between rough sleepers and zombies – the prospect of kingship sounds odd and uncomfortable. The taste of ambition is new to him; he swithers this way and that, and it is not inevitable that hunger for power will become his defining characteristic. Then it takes root.
It is the same with Jo Mousley as Lady Macbeth. Appearing in a maroon jumper and blue opal necklace, she has a suburban plainness, an ordinary woman thinking on her feet. Like her husband, she comes and goes. When the two of them hatch their murderous plot, they take turns buckling and cajoling, equivocal one moment, certain the next. They are as bad – and as good – as each other. They are well matched.
Far from being born tyrants, these Macbeths are an everyday couple taking their chances. The banquet scene looks less like a state dinner than a light supper in a mews apartment, complete with lounge-jazz accompaniment. This could happen to anyone.
If Lady Macbeth’s sudden madness has any justification (as ever, it is a little odd), it is that she is out of her depth. Made jittery by any untoward sound, she is not nearly as hard-hearted as she likes to pretend. Dashing out the brains of babies is so much bravado.
Performed on a rusty warehouse set designed by Rachael Canning, this GCSE-friendly production is lucid and straightforward. If it does not set the pulse racing, it presents in Alvin-Wilson a thoughtful, reflective Macbeth whose good sense is overcome by blunt rage.
At Hull Truck until 28 February. On tour until 18 April
