Folger's (And Teller's) Magical Macbeth

Sure it’s got magic, but the Teller (of Penn & Teller fame) co-directed Macbeth has something even more unusual – it manages to inject a sense of wonder, terror and even fun into a work that is most often played as a rather dour tragedy.

The blood-soaked Teller-Aaron Posner Macbeth, now at Folger, is a lot more interested in making the Weird Sisters gruesome (and boy, do they) than it is meditating on the title character’s lack of morality, and its performers give complex enough performances that the approach doesn’t seem superficial or sensational (ok, maybe once - the talking baby Satan is a little silly).

Teller’s jolts of magic come in small, resonant doses. Some of these you can kind of see coming (when a mirror is a major set piece during the "Is this a dagger?" speech, you kind of figure one will mysteriously appear), but the execution is still remarkable. Other tricks, such as Banquo's ghost, appearing and disappearing rapidly while bleeding profusely, handily employ Teller’s trademark sense of misdirection.

Macbeth's weird sisters, despite or maybe because of their Halloween-style monster costumes, are genuinely creepy and disgusting. One of them, Eric Hissom, does double duty as a drunken porter, whose audience interactions provide much-needed gross out comic relief. Another visually-satisfying aspect of the production is fight director Dale Anthony Girard harsh, earthy and convincing stage violence.