Macbeth
By Mary Alderson
Shakespeare’s Macbeth takes us back to 11th century Scotland for a bloody battle when an ambitious General, abetted by his cruel wife, decides he wants to be King and kills all those who might stand in his way. But the Macbeth on stage this season at the Stratford Festival is a slightly different story, even though the main characters are the same.
Instead of visiting Scotland in the Middle Ages, the audience will be transported to Montreal in the late 1990s. Macbeth is a member of a violent motorcycle club, involved in a deadly turf war.
Veteran Stratford actor Tom McCamus is Macbeth, covered in tattoos and wearing leather. “It’s the Quebec Biker Wars, and we will be riding bikes on stage,” he explains, confessing that it will be electric e-bikes dressed up to look like motorcycles. “The hierarchy of Scottish Kings is comparable to biker gangs,” he says, “the fiefdoms of old Scotland are like the chapters in motorcycle gangs.”
McCamus is pleased to be working with director Robert Lepage again. McCamus was in the cast of the amazing production of Coriolanus directed by Lepage in 2018. With its realistic projections and moving set pieces, along with Stratford’s best actors, Coriolanus was highly acclaimed. Many of those outstanding cast members are back in Macbeth, to work with Lepage again. Lapage is the artistic director of Ex Machina, a production company based in Le Diamant Theatre in Quebec City. Macbeth in French ran at Le Diamant this spring, and set pieces then moved to Stratford.
McCamus praises Lepage’s vision. “He puts all the elements together and has a great creative team. The set is huge and it produces an illusion on the Avon stage,” he says.
This is McCamus’ 18th season at Stratford, but not 18 consecutive years. He’s moved around, working at the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, various Toronto theatre companies, and in film and television. “I’ve been lucky enough to be asked back to Stratford and it is nice to be able to come back,” he says.
McCamus likes playing Macbeth: “He’s a manipulative, nasty person, with monstrous ambition.” In that way, the character Macbeth is similar to the devious Judge Brack in Hedda Gabler, a role he played last year at Stratford. Another similar character he’s played is Leonard, a jaded and unpleasant professor in Seminar. “I like playing these slimy guys,” says McCamus with a laugh.
Lucy Peacock, another long-time Stratford star, is perfect in nasty roles, too. She plays his partner-in-crime, Lady Macbeth, a manipulative and deadly biker chick.
McCamus is in two Shakespearean plays this season which he describes as a good mix. While he’s enjoying being the overly ambitious and disagreeable Macbeth, he has a pleasant change in A Winter’s Tale. He plays the Shepherd, who he says is a nice, “woolly” old man.
Macbeth is playing in repertory at the Avon Theatre until November 2, 2025.
Photo: Lucy Peacock as Lady Macbeth and Tom McCamus as Macbeth in Macbeth. Stratford Festival 2025. Photo by David Hou.