Almost everyone has read or seen a Shakespeare play, so most are familiar with his plots and themes. However, the O’Kane Theater has added a twist to the play; it is set during the Prohibition era in Chicago. Without spoiling too much of the play, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth will be bootleggers running a speakeasy during treacherous times.
Now that the plot is out of the way, who are the students behind the leads?
Eian Garza and Sofia Hurtado will be playing Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, respectively. They are both University of Houston-Downtown students who have a passion for the arts and theater. Both leads expressed a lifelong interest in theater, with hopes of one day pursuing acting as a profession. When asked what motivated each actor to audition for the role, both had answers that mirrored one another.
Hurtado, who will play Lady Macbeth, shared that she first encountered the play in high school and developed a connection to Lady Macbeth.
“I read this play for the first time in ninth grade, and at first I was like, ‘Oh, it’s cool, whatever,’ but I revisited it in my senior year, and I was like, ‘Wait a minute, she’s a badass,’” remarked Hurtado.
Aside from Lady Macbeth’s strength and charisma, her complexity as a woman in a patriarchal society captivated her. “She’s [Lady Macbeth] is so out of the norm, and no matter what scenario — if it’s Scotland or Chicago, 1920s — she’s generally so interesting. I’ve always liked female characters that everybody says, “she’s evil,” but she was just a woman reacting to the society around her, to the fact that her only power is through her husband, to the fact that she can’t have any real power. All she can do is try to defend herself and her family,” Sofia said.
As for Garza, this was his first encounter with Macbeth, but he decided to pursue the role to prove to himself that he could grow and improve as an actor. He shared that he had previously held a similar role but felt he did not do his character justice.
“It’s [his motivation] a bit more of a personal vendetta. I have played a character who is somewhat similar, not nearly to the same degree of insanity, and it’s always been in the back of my mind that I didn’t do good enough in that role. So, there’s this lingering part of me that gives me extra motivation. I don’t want to repeat that. This is going to be a redemption,” stated Garza.
He also conveyed how once he got to know Macbeth as a character, he found himself appreciating his complexity. “You [actors] start to get into the headspace and try to understand the character. It does very much come across like what you’re saying [Sofia’s statements on Lady Macbeth], where a lot of people will say they’re an evil person, and I’m not going to forgive them for what they’ve done, but there’s always that bit of, “I get it,” he said.
Aside from the cast, the production offers a creative edge within the confines of the canonical play. In Fidell’s words, “With Shakespeare, it’s hard to go off book. It’s been around for 400 years, a lot of people know it,” referring to the familiarity with the tempo of the iambic pentameter. Considering these limitations, the UHD production plans to emphasize certain verbal stresses and physical actions to expand the capacity of the original narrative.
Through the dedication of its student performers and its inventive setting, this production of Macbeth breathes new life into a centuries-old tragedy. By humanizing its characters and exploring their motivations, the play invites audiences to look beyond labels of “good” and “evil” and instead consider the complexities of ambition and power.
