Macbeth

Patrick Stewart boldly reasserts his reputation as one of the great Shakespearean actors of our time in a commanding performance as Macbeth. Fresh from their landmark UK production of The Tempest, Stewart reunites with rising star director Rupert Goold in the harrowing study of the seductive nature of power that was the sold-out, must-see event of the summer in its Chichester Festival Theatre debut.

Set in an industrial chamber that is equally military hospital ward, kitchen, torture chamber, and abattoir, Goold’s eerily modern Macbeth rings with the echoes of Stalinist terror. Macbeth is a decorated and loyal war hero, but loyalty only goes so far when greatness and history beckon and murder is only a matter of military coups and secret assassinations.

Stewart’s genius is to reveal Macbeth as a moral man turned ruthless paranoid, one who understands exactly what he’s gaining — and what he’s losing — as he coldly disposes of the friends and family who stand in the way of his irrepressible ambition.