Dance

Lady Macbeth:unsex me here

Tron, Glasgow

Mary Brennan

four stars

IN Shakespeare’s play, we are aware of strikingly different sides to Lady Macbeth without discovering much about her as a woman. Some lines suggest she’s given birth, but no children call her “mother” in the text. In Shakespeare’s time, the role would have been played by a male actor – does that significantly “unsex” her?

Forensic curiosity, as well as a flair for melding dance with potent theatricality, have always been strong suits in Kally Lloyd Jones’s creative armoury. Both traits are well to fore in this latest work for her own Company Chordelia, underpinning a dance-drama of quite troubling beauty, psychological insights and richly symbolic imaginings .

Three me, seated alone, in their upstage dressing cubicles, are preparing to perform. There’s already a hint of ritual, as if the act of immersion in another character – in this case a woman – has magic in it. And that degree of conjuring hovers over other aspects of this dark, poetic piece. All three are Lady Macbeth, but are they also the witches? Does the blood that one smears on the other two come from the murdered Duncan, or has this woman other, suppressed, causes for the soul’s grief and guilt that drives her mad? One especially harrowing moment is when the men – Thomas J Baylis, Jacob Casselden and Jack Webb – drop the babies they have been nursing: clunk – the shawls hold only stones. The re-iterated cradling motif that thereafter haunts the movement is done by empty, barren arms. There is occasional text, heard in distorted voice-overs but also seen in the BSL (British Sign Language) that is an integral part of the dance. Indeed – reflecting the production's association with the Solar Bear company – one of the dancers is profoundly deaf, not that you’d know from his seamless involvement in the choreography. It’s a triumph for all three, unstintingly expressive performers, and a wonderful provocation to look deep into the tragedy of Lady Macbeth.