You call this a riff on the Scottish play: how far are you sticking with the original text and how far are you working your way around it?
Many familiar lines made it into our show in different ways, but most of what our characters have to say is new along with many new characters. Storywise, everything that happened in Shakespeare's play happened before and after our part of the story.
Ours is bonus material, if you will, that adds The Macbeths responding to their immense guilt and Macbeth's public meltdown at his state dinner by going on a weekend holiday to get their heads on straight. Spoiler Alert: It doesn't go as planned.
There are always plenty of Shakespeare's at the fringe: what is it that made you want to work with Macbeth?
I believe the equation is "Tragedy of Macbeth plus Time Equals Comedy". It's time Macbeth got roasted. I'm also a huge Shakespeare fan, as is the cast. Macbeth is my favorite Shakes play because of its dark twisted nature. And it's short! I've always enjoyed the Porter character and the initial idea was to have the traditional story seen from his perspective. It did not become that although Porter is very important. He's the only character aware that he's in a play.
What stage did the beach appear as part of your dramaturgy?
Very early. Every production of Macbeth I have seen has always been very dark and shadowy. Rightly so! It was a natural inclination to want to put the main characters in the opposite of their dark, dank castle, thus a sunny beach. In determining what kind of swimsuit Macbeth would wear, or that we'd like to see him in, led us to a 1920s influence.
Is there anything about your version of Macbeth that might perhaps make it stand out at the fringe this year?
Absolutely! One thing we do with our show is explore the Macbeth's relationship history. You'll find out things about them you never knew, such as their first names and what their first date was like. Our Lady and King Macbeth, Wendi Weber and Ric Walker, could legitimately be in a straight production of Macbeth. In fact, our Lady Macbeth has played Lady Macbeth! We're not only actors, but sketch comedians and improvisers, as well. When we do shows around a theme, we have one foot in theater and one foot in sketch comedy. You can see the bones of a sketch revue in our play. We also use our satirical muscles to make fun of nepotism vs ambition and Shakespearean tropes like asides and soliloquies. Not too many versions of Macbeth have the goal "to make you laugh".
And the inevitable question: what are you hoping to achieve by coming to Edinburgh this August?
Superstardom. We won't settle for less. For me personally, it's to share our work, have audiences enjoy our work, and hopefully get some professional attention for my writing skills. I'm also looking forward to seeing an abundance of great shows and meeting other artists. I also really enjoy getting soup at Union of Genius and will probably be there every day.
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