Choreographer: Temitope Ajose
Lady Macbeth has been an inspiration to artists and performers since Shakespeare created the character, and now Temitope Ajose uses her narrative as the basis for a new performance piece at The Place, Lady M (At Home with Lady Macbeth). Blending speeches with theatrical presentation, spoken word poetry and movement, it’s difficult to call this a dance but it certainly has dance accents, but running for an unbroken 90-minutes, this often-perplexing production lacks Lady Macbeth’s sense of direct purpose.
Ajose uses Shakespeare’s architecture and Lady Macbeth’s monologues but mixes them up throughout the show. The audience is greeted by the disturbed hostess in the bar, performing her sleepwalking torment in a nightgown before inviting everyone into the auditorium where Ajose explores different parts of the play, offering refreshment – real red wine which is hastily collected up undrunk by Lady M’s “helpers”– and performing a sensual dance as she changes into something more fitting.
Dance, when it happens, can be insightful, particularly a section in which Lady M explores gender through costume, dressing in male attire while reciting the ‘unsex me here’ speech. This is followed by a short piece of jazz ballet choreographed to a country / folksy song that makes for a fascinating contrast of achingly cool and emotional introspection. But the dancing is an afterthought and is soon forgotten as the show bends towards the surreal.
Largely, though, Ajose interprets Lady Macbeth through shaking fits, shuddering and jerky movements that snap between different extremes of personality. As the show unfolds, these become too similar with lots of flailing arms that show little development in the character. Nor does it obviously respond to the changing circumstances presumably happening offstage. As a result, the show becomes increasingly disconnected, even scrappy, built in segments but not forming a unified whole.
There is also some audience participation. Everyone is given a coloured wristband on entry, but this never forms part of the performance. Early on everyone stands to play a Yes / No game with questions ranging from having covid to whether everyone paid their rent. Later a person is selected from the audience to participate in the show’s big moral dilemma. Choosing not to perform it sees them expelled from the room and not allowed to return. It’s a risky strategy with paying ticket holders but then they get to leave earlier than everyone else. Finally, everyone writes a wish on a piece of paper that is mashed into a bowl of stage blood but its not clear how any of these interactive techniques align with the Macbeth story.
All of this takes time: time to change into four or five costumes, time to give everyone a chocolate, time to perform a gangster rap but it’s never clear what any of it is for. There is a real mish mash of unstructured ideas that start to feel rather laboured. What does this tell us about Lady Macbeth, about Ajose or even about ourselves? Lady M (At Home with Lady Macbeth) feels like a work in progress, a try-out of ideas and engagement activities that needs some honing. And what it really needs is a lot more dance.
Runs until 13 May 2023
