Tonight we (I and the pets) are watching a version of Macbeth with Fassbender and Cotillard because the Sir Patrick Stewart version was not available on streaming. It’s very Game of Thrones-y from a makeup, costuming and set design perspective (so far). There has also been a, like, three-minute slo-mo battle scene with no dialogue that made me nervous for either the total running time or the edits we were about to see. I am all for trying new things with Shakespeare, but it really wasn’t written with long, dramatic action scenes in mind.
I wonder if, in 500 years, people will be staging adaptations of Aaron Sorkin films where all the characters speak while standing stationary, then move to a new location silently, then speak again. That would be a six-hour episode of The West Wing, easily.
What I’m saying here is: there’s a lot of dialogue in Shakespeare.
Dana White 