The Maggie Walker drama department presented the play Macbeth Thursday, November 17, through Saturday, November 19. It was a well-received production with a successful execution from the cast and the crew. The show lasted around two hours, with an intermission in between acts. Presented with an apocalyptic take, the play added a mystic feel and reeled the audience in.

McKinley Dillon (‘23), who played Lady Macbeth and joined drama freshman year, describes her involvement as “such a fulfilling experience.”  Dillon says, “Everyone feels like a member of your family, and as I've grown older, I've appreciated that aspect more and more.” Evidently, the Maggie Walker drama members are a close knit family and work very hard together in order to bring their excellent productions to light. Greta Shope (‘23), the head of sound, has also been in drama since her freshman year, when she began as an actor in The Addams Family. As she fell in love with the community, she started pursuing roles behind the scene, hence sound design.

Both Dillon and Shope experienced the stressful tech week while also balancing their schoolwork. Shope describes the tech week as “a hot mess… that comes together so seamlessly. Every show, I hear actors and crew members saying, ‘This will be a disaster!’ but we’re always wrong. Somewhere in between the hours of rehearsals, it all comes together.” Dillon similarly found tech week to be stressful, however it proved to be “worth it in the long run,” as it was exciting to see everyone’s hard work and determination come together to create this production. 

Despite the complex Shakespearean language in Macbeth, the cast was able to overcome the language barrier and thoroughly portray their characters’ emotions. Dillon expresses her experience overcoming the struggle of memorizing lines. “I was overwhelmed at first…as well as [the lines] being in Old English, but with the help of some wonderful people and encouragement, it was doable.” She explains that doubt is an undeniable feeling when it comes to sports and art. However, once confidence is found, the success that will surely follow is a great feeling.

Behind the scenes of the production, the tech crew worked through a lot of trial and error, testing different ideas for the director, producer, and actors. Slowly, the script and the crew’s lighting and sound effects merge. In terms of Shope’s personal Macbeth experience as a member of the sound crew, she explains, “Macbeth required a lot of listening to horror movie soundtracks and sound effects to find what truly creeped me out so that I could use it to inspire the sound design for our spooky, post-apocalyptic version of the Shakespeare classic.” Shope also mentioned a fun fact about the production: Zach Carlson (‘23), who is head of lights, “taught himself how to design a lighting setup and even made a special light fixture out of a soda can.” 

Shope and Dillon both describe the MLWGS community as wonderful and incredibly encouraging to the drama department’s artistic ventures, providing confidence that ultimately made this production possible. Dillon states, “Once you finally give yourself that pat on the back and gain the confidence to show your real potential, it's a great feeling.” As the final year of Shope’s high school drama experience comes to a close, she feels “totally confident in what the next generation of tech is capable of,” as she was able to watch them grow “as technicians and as leaders.” Presenting the fall production proved to be complex in regards to the language and material associated with the play, but the cast and crew’s perseverance and dedication led to the amazing delivery of Macbeth.