The idea for Macbettu came about in February 2006 while shooting documentary photos of the Sardinian carnivals.
The gloomy sounds produced by cowbells and ancient sonorous objects, animal pelts, horns, and cork. Sullen masks and blood, red wine, the forces of nature tamed by man and above all the dark winter. The similarities between Sardinia and Scotland are surprising as are Shakespeare’s masterpiece, Sardinian carnival characters and masks.
One image above all, persisted: that afternoon as the Mamuthones paraded through the streets of Mamoiada, I heard an ancient rhythm in the distance, an imminent force of nature about to strike relentlessly, placidly and unrestrainable at the same time: the forest was getting closer. A young child wearing an Issohadores mask reminded me of the crowned child who prophesizes that Macbeth will not be defeated until he sees Birnam Wood move toward the castle… the march of the Mamuthones.
A few days later I thought to have recognized Banquo and Macbeth in two children who were fearlessly scrutinising their destinies through my camera lens. And then the witches, the attitadoras of the Bosa Carnival; men dressed as old women in mourning imploring the audience for unu tikkirigheddu de latte (a drop of milk) between shouts and sardonic laughter accompanied by obscene sexual innuendos. As in Kurosawa’s film Throne of Blood where the three witches are transformed into a single ghostly and pale Parca at the spinning wheel, the three witches that weave Macbeth’s destiny are sublimated into the mask of the Filonzana, the mysterious and frightening old woman at the Ottana Carnival intent on spinning the thread of destiny.
In one week of photographic coverage, I couldn’t stop thinking about the possibility of translating Macbeth into Sardinian, and, in keeping with classical Elizabethan tradition, representing it using only male actors. The same men who impressed me greatly with the force of their gestures and voices, who had the confidence of Dionysius and at the same time the ability to perform traditional dances and songs with remarkable precision.
Folkloristic aspects apart, the costumes, masks, objects, sounds and songs were without a doubt the perfect means to express that tragic destiny. Sardinian Carnivals would be inoculated deep into the play, dissolving any deep-rooted ties and evident similarities immediately.
The Sardinian carnivals became a rich source to tap into for useful hints, indications with respect to the staging, creating a space for reciprocal contamination, where each simplistic representation of the drama is suspended giving way to something more fundamental: the revelation of tragic archetypes that prevail in Shakespeare’s characters as do the figures that come to life in the carnivals and perhaps in the viewers, too.
During rehearsals, the actors experienced all these elements, later eliminated through a process of distillation. The figures remain delicate shells in which to infuse the souls of the characters, and their respective emotions each time they are on stage, subtle traces, like the shadow of an aura. Everything is soaked in blood, yet not a drop is shed.
The deafening noise of hundreds of cowbells is replaced by the subdued sound of sheep grazing in the night. The witches start to dance a ballu tundu (Sardinian folk dance) before they hurl themselves into a vortex and vanish. The masks dissolved into the iconic faces of the actors, later becoming cork bark where the knots look like eyes watching us. It’s grain sneers of war.
When I rewrote the text, I eliminated all the female roles but the story didn’t seem to suffer any deep trauma. I condensed all the women into a single mother goddess, bearer of death: Lady Macbeth. Taller and stronger than the men, just like one of the oldest representations found in Ozieri, slender, abstract, and transcendent: The 4000-year-old figure of a woman.
By Alessandro Serra