Review-Dunsinane-National Theatre of Scotland and RSC
4-5-14
By: Tom Hope
David Greig’s ‘Dunsinane’, as a self-conscious sequel to ‘Macbeth’, is a revisionist tale of a revisionist tale. First produced in 2010, it draws clear parallels with Britain’s occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan as well as the burgeoning push for an independent Scotland. 4 years on, with the Scots poised to referend their separatism and Britain’s further intervention in Syria (for now at least) averted, this production’s tour of China seems timely in asking what lessons we can learn from history and the shifting sands of our collective memory on which history sits.
‘Macbeth’ was ever a play seen through English eyes. Shakespeare’s first for the new (Scottish) King James 1, it pitted his forebear Banquo against the clan chief Macbeth who (historically) ruled Scotland for 17 years (from 1040 onwards) with his queen Gruach – and, as the Bard presents it, the aid of witchcraft and ever larger helpings of murder to shore up his bloody claims to the crown. In truth, his reign is now thought to have been relatively benign (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macbeth,_King_of_Scotland) until deposed by an invading English army led by Lord Siward of Northumbria to restore Malcolm, son of the former King Duncan; and Duncan’s murder whilst guest of honour in Macbeth’s castle is now regarded as a Malcolm/Siward respinning of the real Duncan’s death on a punitive foray into Macbeth’s domain of Moray, making Macbeth his rightful vanquisher-successor.
‘Dunsinane’ maintains this English perspective. From the get-go, English troops - each chesting a large George cross like former day football supporters – enforce the Malcolm-Siward invasion. They win the all-important opening battle to slay Macbeth and capture his castle at Dunsinane. Then, little by little, they become embattled on-lookers as the all-important ensuing peace is lost and Scotland descends once more into conflict and chaos, with their commander and general ‘good guy’ Siward outwitted by Macbeth’s surviving queen…
It’s a great moment when Siward twigs who he’s just captured at Dunsinane. ‘But you said she was dead – by her own hand – after going mad…’ he stutters to the saintly Malcolm - who shrugs and then, when pushed by Siward, asks menacingly ‘are you calling me a liar?’
This deft comic undercutting of Shakespeare’s certainties sets the tone for what follows: Malcolm and MacDuff want Gruach dead - but the all-powerful Siward is too noble for that and understands also how much better it will be for peace to win her over to a marriage of convenience with Malcolm - but, as Siward woos the bewitching lady, the question of who is in fact spinning what to whom and for why becomes ever more complex…
This is high quality political theatre and a cracking production all round. Siobahn Redmond’s Gruach and Darrell d’Silva’s Siward are compelling as the central protagonists but it’s the overall strength of the ensemble which really carries the show. The music – an on-stage trio of guitar, strings and percussion – is perfectly judged to lend atmosphere, melding Celtic and Provencal folkloric styles in a wrapper of electrified modernity, and the songs ‘danced’ by Gruach’s ‘women’ are especially enchanting. The austerity of the set – a brooding Celtic cross atop a battlement of stone steps - offsets the invading English uniformity. The bitter-sweet humour complements the multi-layered ironies of what the characters say and do. And yet, and yet…
OK, I’ll ‘fess up. Macbeth is one of my not-so-favourite Shakespeares because it’s basically a car crash in slo-mo to demonstrate how power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Strip away the sophistication of Greig’s web-spinning and you have the same slo-mo arc: the inevitable failure of the army of invasion which at some point has to let go and ‘go home’. It’s cleverly angled as ‘good guy’ Siward struggles not to emulate the tyrant he has deposed in his ever more desperate attempts to establish peace and as Gruach cannot renounce the authority by which her people define both her and themselves. But by the close they are locked in the same seemingly irreconcilable and ever more paralyzing conflict. The characters have never really transcended their roles as players on a chess board they never really command…
That, in the end, is this play’s message: as Malcolm pointedly tells Siward somewhere around the midpoint: ‘you seem to think peace is a natural order when in fact it’s the opposite.’ The resolution is that there is no resolution.
In a world so much in need of restorative harmony, with a play which seeks to set the record straight on the way myths are made, it’s disconcerting to come away from such an accomplished production feeling so dissatisfied: that so much has been said and so little has been resolved. But it does entertain. And it should make you think…
Dusinane is playing at Kwai Fong Theatre through May 4th. For more information, click here.
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