The Scottish Play

This article is about the euphemism for the play Macbeth. For Lee Blessing's play, see The Scottish Play (Lee Blessing play).

The Scottish Play and the Bard's play are euphemisms for William Shakespeare's Macbeth. The first is a reference to the play's Scottish setting, the second a reference to Shakespeare's popular nickname. According to a theatrical superstition, called the Scottish curse, speaking the name Macbeth inside a theatre will cause disaster. A variation of the superstition forbids direct quotation of the play (except during rehearsals) while inside a theater.

Because of this superstition, the lead character is most often referred to as the Scottish King or Scottish Lord. Sometimes Mackers is used to avoid saying the name, mostly in North America.

Origins

Those who believe in the curse claim that real spells are cast in the three witches scene. Some believers claim that including the character Hecate, frequently cut from productions of the play due to questions about her part's authorship, intensifies the curse. Actors that do not believe will also abstain from saying the name due to being taught not to and seeing it as a taboo.

Productions of Macbeth are said to have been plagued with accidents, many ending in death. According to legend, this dates back to the premiere of the play: an actor died because a real dagger was mistakenly used instead of the prop. The play does include more fight scenes and other such opportunities for accidents than does the average play, and the atmosphere in the backstage area of old-fashioned theatres was a prime setting for disasters, especially when dealing with potentially dangerous equipment. This would explain the accidents without invoking magic.

The popularity of the superstition might also be related to its mild hazing aspect. Veteran actors might relate some tale of woe that they witnessed personally due to someone invoking the curse, lending credibility and immediacy to the tale.

One hypothesis for the origin of this superstition is that Macbeth, being a popular play, was commonly put on by theatres in financial trouble, or that the high production costs of Macbeth put theatres in financial trouble, and hence an association was made between a production of Macbeth and theatres going out of business.

According to the superstition, Shakespeare got a few of the lines from an actual coven of witches and when they saw the play they were greatly offended and cursed the play. Another tradition tells that the original propmaster could not find a suitable pot for a cauldron and stole one from a coven, who then cursed the play in revenge for the theft. It is believed that breaking the taboo calls the ghosts of the three witches to the show and it is they who cause all the mishaps. The last, and probably most spectacular view of the curse is that Shakespeare used the curse in the play to actually curse the play himself, guaranteeing that no one other than himself would be able to direct the play. It is also reported that when Shakespeare learned that James I, whose Scottish heritage he was trying to celebrate with the play, had not particularly enjoyed it, he became bitterly disappointed and would only refer to the play as "that Scottish play" for the rest of his life.

Cleansing rituals

When the name of the play is spoken in a theatre, tradition requires the person who spoke it to leave, perform traditional cleansing rituals, and be invited back in. The rituals are supposed to ward off the evil that uttering the play's name is feared to bring on.

The rituals include turning three times, spitting over one's left shoulder, swearing, or reciting a line from another of Shakespeare's plays. Popular lines for this purpose include, "Angels and ministers of grace defend us" (Hamlet 1.IV), "If we shadows have offended" (A Midsummer Night's Dream 5.ii), and "Fair thoughts and happy hours attend on you" (The Merchant of Venice, 3.IV). A more elaborate cleansing ritual involves leaving the theatre, spinning around and brushing oneself off, and saying "Macbeth" three times before entering again.

Cultural references

In film

• The Dario Argento film Opera (1987) depicts an unlucky staging of Giuseppe Verdi's opera Macbeth.

In television

• In the "Sense and Senility" episode of the British sitcom Blackadder the Third, Blackadder terrorizes actors by repeatedly saying "Macbeth" and forcing them into their rituals, which involve chanting and painfully tweaking their noses.
• In the episode "Wrapped Up In Death" of the show Castle, Castle's mother responds to the speaking of the name Macbeth by crossing her index fingers together. After the name is spoken again she spits over her left shoulder three times, then tells a story of when she said the name in high school. The director makes her leave the theatre, run around the building counter-clockwise, and knock on the door until she is allowed back in. Interestingly, the director speaks the name Macbeth as well, without realizing it.
• Some of the cleansing rituals are demonstrated in season 1, episode 12 of the TV series Mystery Hunters.
• In the sixth season of the HBO series Oz, the prisoners put on a stage performance of Macbeth. The name of the play is said many times and, throughout the season, every prisoner to take on the role of Macbeth dies. This pattern culminates during the final production wherein the actor playing Macbeth is 'accidentally' stabbed by a real knife instead of a prop (much like the legend of the very first Macbeth performance).
• The adaption of Macbeth for ShakespeaRe-Told references this comically: the equivalent of Macbeth goes into a rage whenever Gordon Ramsay is mentioned by name, so the rest of his staff refer to him as "The Scottish Chef".
• The main story arc of the second season of the Canadian TV series Slings and Arrows follows a staging of Macbeth. During the season's main title sequence and theme music, two veteran Shakespearean actors/performers sing that they will never play a character "whose name one dare not speak". The supposed curse is also referred to in several episodes, including an ironic scene in which a director spins on a stage to dispel the curse, but ends up falling and breaking her neck.
• In "The Regina Monologues" episode of The Simpsons, Ian McKellen is struck by lightning after saying the play's name. The joke is compounded when Marge says "Good luck", causing a letter to fall off the marquee and crush McKellen.
• In Greys Anatomy episode 21 in season 2, Cristina Yang enters an empty ER and says, "Its dead quiet," to which Izzie Stevens replies, "Thats like saying Macbeth in the theater," A patient promptly enters vomiting blood as do several other emergent cases.
• The actor Adam Woodyatt, when appearing as a contestant on The Weakest Link quiz show, was disqualified for insisting on using "the Scottish Play" as his answer instead of Macbeth.

External links

• Review: Curse of the Play Review of a newspaper article on the superstitions about Macbeth.
• Supernatural on Stage: Ghosts and Superstitions of the Theater
• Macbeth: The Male Medusa
• Chronology of alleged Macbeth-related tragedies