Shake & Stir reimagine Shakespeare’s Macbeth for the age of drone warfare, live-streamed atrocities, and social media scrutiny, building a contemporary theatrical spectacle around a 400-year-old text about prophecy, power, and ambition.

Known for large-scale adaptations of literary classics like Jane Eyre and Frankenstein, Shake & Stir celebrates its 20th year in 2026. The company has brought Shakespeare to schools around the country for many years, but this is its first Shakespearean work for the mainstage.

Shake & Stir Theatre Co’s Macbeth. Photo © Brit Creative

Shakespeare’s shortest tragedy, Macbeth follows the titular character as he puts his faith in the witches’ prophecy that he will become king of Scotland. Consumed by the pursuit of power and urged onward by his equally ambitious wife, he kills the king and ascends the throne, but soon both Macbeths descend into a dizzying spiral of murder, paranoia, and tyranny.

Directed by co-Artistic Director Nick Skubij, with Associate Director Francesca Savige, Shake & Stir’s production augments the original text with modern weaponry, industrial settings, and large-scale, high-impact audiovisual elements.

Drawing thematically on political theatre, the 24-hour news cycle, and celebrity surveillance, cameras fly in and out to feed live video onto an array of screens on the proscenium and the entirety of the back wall. There was a slight lag between the audio and video on opening night.

Video design by Nevin Howell and Jeremy Gordon imitates news feeds and brings the audience new points of view, from news-style close-ups on the Macbeths to shaky handheld footage. Overt textual messaging and fast-paced video montages of explosions, marching boots, and waving flowers stop just short of including Edwin Starr’s cover of War.

The sleek, industrial world of this Macbeth is designed by Josh McIntosh. The cracked concrete and exposed steel beams of a warzone, along with the use of guns and smartphones, establish a setting closer to our own time than Shakespeare’s world of swords and horse-borne messengers. Characters pace and settings circulate on the revolve, although the meeting between Macduff and Malcolm in England seems to be revolving purely to inject momentum into the scene.

Nelle Lee in Shake & Stir Theatre Co’s Macbeth. Photo © Brit Creative

This production is still set in a medieval-style Scottish monarchy, although it could feasibly be anywhere. In both combat and communication, however, the inconsistent use of modern technology occasionally punctures the illusion.

Costuming was also modern, with nods to the original setting in Banquo’s kilt and the white harness that criss-crossed Macduff’s body like the saltire of the Scottish flag. In the final Act, minor characters inexplicably shifted to costumes in shades of brown and cream akin to current workplace fashions.

Lighting design by Jason Glenwright creates striking silhouettes and atmospheric settings, from the cool contrasts of an expensive banquet to the billowing chaos of the Witches’ cauldron.

Sound design by Guy Webster further ratchets up the tension and amplifies emotion, from the eerie whispered prophecies to the strings underscoring Macbeth’s soliloquy after the death of his wife.

Jeremiah Wray in Shake & Stir Theatre Co’s Macbeth. Photo © Brit Creative

Jeremiah Wray plays Macbeth as a straight-backed war hero, slowly shattering under the weight of his crime and desperately clinging to an ill-gotten crown as everything that had previously given him meaning – king, countrymen, friends – falls away. Wray embodies Macbeth’s cold-blooded violence as well as his gasping, clamouring guilt and slow descent into visions of death and betrayal.

Shake & Stir co-Artistic Director Nelle Lee plays Lady Macbeth with a sharp edge, her emotions and ambitions tightly coiled. Jodie Le Vesconte demonstrates impressive versatility across a range of characters, from a wide-eyed Weird Sister to the magnanimous King Duncan and the comedic relief of the drunken Porter.

Johnny Balbuziente delivers a strong, grounded performance as Macbeth’s loyal friend Banquo in life, but his blood-drenched spectral appearances are more comic than chilling. Pacharo Mzembe tackles Macduff with intensely performed emotion, and Will Carseldine brings a quiet, youthful seriousness to Malcolm, rightful heir to the throne Macbeth has usurped.

Rachel Nutchey is excellent across multiple roles, her brief moments and brutal death as Lady Macduff especially memorable. Eddie Cane, from Shake & Stir’s Greenroom ensemble for secondary students, delivers an affecting performance as Macduff’s young son, and his chase scene with Wray’s Macbeth hums with tension.

Athletic fight choreography by Nigel Poulton is brilliantly executed, particularly the murder of Banquo and the final confrontation between Macbeth and Macduff.

Shake & Stir’s thoroughly modern Macbeth transplants this centuries-old story to a contemporary context, amplifying the visceral impact of the Scottish play with all the timeless hunger and ambition of its titular characters.

Shake & Stir’s Macbeth is art the Playhouse, QPAC until 21 June.