Company Report

1. What happens in your scene? Outline the basic events.

a. King and captain begin to talk about Macbeth and the battle

b. Captain leaves and Ross enters

c. Ross begins to talk with king about the victory

d. Macbeth receives title of Thane of Cawdor

2. What do you think are the key purposes of your scene?

a. introduce Macbeth as a strong character and glorify him

b. show trust between King and Macbeth

c. explain how Macbeth becomes the Thane of Cawdor, which sets in motion the events of the rest of the play

3. How does this scene fit into Shakespeare’s overall purpose in the play?

This scene builds up the power and respect of Macbeth which will eventually cause him to become corrupt and lose all of it.

4. In a one paragraph essay with three quotations, defend your company’s choice of production style. Be sure to analyze the significance of the quotations in connection with the choices that you made.

Though our portrayal of Act One Scene Two of Macbeth is very true to the original play, we personalized certain aspects such as the captain muttering his lines in agony, the King wearing a ragged cape, and Macbeth and Macdonwald having a fight scene in the background. Although the playbook does not specifically tell us that the captain is in agony we can tell that he is when he says "But I am faint; my gashes cry for help" (I, 2, 42). The captain uses words and phrases such as, "faint," and, "cry for help," to imply the extent of his pain. Therefore we have the captain expressing agony through his performance. Throughout the scene the king's ragged cape foreshadows his inevitable downfall when Macbeth says, "Here lay Duncan, his silver skin laced with Golden blood" (II, 2, 113-114). The ragged cape represents the King's ragged future and the terrible fate that is in store for him at the hands of Macbeth. Although the duel between Macbeth and Macdonwald is not specifically described in the play we have chosen to demonstrate the fight scene between the two in the background while the Captain is describing it in order to further emphasize the importance of the scene. This victory by Macbeth is revealed when the Captain says "Till he unseamed him from the nave to the chops, and fixed his head upon our battlements" (I, 2, 22-23). The words the captain uses to phrase his recount of the fight portray Macbeth’s confidence and unimpeded will at the beginning of the story, as opposed to his more confused and wavering personality later on. The actual fight is very important because it gives Macbeth the glory in battle which endears him to the King. Since the duel between the two is very important to the plot of the play we have chose to emphasize it more in our portrayal of the scene. We have personalized these aspects of the play in order to relay the topics and themes of this scene more vividly.