Mr. LoAlbos stance on the Curse of Macbeth: Does it exist? Perhaps. There are a series of misfortunes that have befallen people who have supposedly uttered the name. More a fun bit of theater superstition than an actuality, there are some in the community that fright at the mention of the word, fearing that the play contains actual witch spells and moments of demon conjuring. Lately, the belief has been falling out of favor with some of the more important people in theater such as Alan Cumming, who performed an incident free version last year, (theguardian/stage/theatreblog/2013/apr/16/lyn-gardner-theatre-blog-dont-mention-m-word) and even Sir Kenneth Branagh (my personal hero), who staged it last year in NYC has said he doesnt buy into it any more, either. The main reason the stories follow the play is because of the extremely physical nature of the action, where risk is taken and the chance for incident is high. Many have been hurt in the past, but for that reason only. So, do I believe in it? Not really. Do I think its fun to think about? You better believe it.
Posted on: Sun, 02 Nov 2014 16:12:37 +0000