"The Scottish Play" - Macbeth Conspiracy Theory

For anyone who has ever been involved in theater and is a touch superstitious, the name "Macbeth" should raise a red flag. Whenever you are in a theater, you are never, ever supposed to say the name "Macbeth" unless that is the show you are doing or it is involved in your show. Otherwise, you refer to the show as The Scottish Play or The Bard's Play among a variety of other names. In this post, I will explain the background of this conspiracy theory.

The theory starts with the show itself. In the show, there are three witches known as The Weird Sisters. Through the course of the show, these witches cast spells and curses to interfere with the plot and actions of characters. Some believe that there was actual black magic involved in the show and that mention of the name brings the black magic into effect.

Before I give this explanation for the theory, I must explain one crucial part of theater superstition: Every theater has at least one ghost. Now that this crucial information has been passed along to you, I can get to this version of the Macbeth theory.

Others believe that the show was haunted. There were countless disasters connected with the show which I'll go over later. It is a popular belief that mentioning the name of the play angers the theater ghost. This then makes the theater ghost do anything it can to ruin and screw up the production being done in the theater.

A third explanation of the curse is the string of bad luck attached to the productions of the Shakespearean play. The article titled "The Curse of Macbeth" says, " The boy actor playing Lady Macbeth died backstage on opening night. In 1934, four actors played Macbeth in a single week. In 1937, Macbeth had to be postponed for three days after a change in directors and because of the death of Lilian Baylis. In 1954, the portrait of Lilian Baylis crashed down on the bar on opening night."

After all of this talk of the consequences, now is the time for some hope. There is a ritual that the offender must perform. This ritual may vary in steps depending on who you ask. The way I say it is to be done is as follows: The person who said the name must be thrown from the theater. Then, they must spin around three times, spit over their left shoulder, swear three times, and beg to be let back in.

No matter what way you look at it, Macbeth will always be a haunted name and a cursed connection to theater.

- Miss Broadway

http://www.edu.pe.ca/gray/class_pages/jecutcliffe/english621/macbeth/Curse.html