[In the following essay, Hale discusses Macbeth's final act in various televised and cinematic versions of the play, many of which suggest a less positive conclusion than Shakespeare's original text provides.]

Critical attention to the nature of ending in drama has been with us at least since Aristotle defined an end as “that which is inevitably or, as a rule, the natural result of something else but from which nothing else follows …” (Poetics 2.5; trans. Fyfe 31). Some sort of re-established family and/or political order is represented to indicate that an appropriate stopping point has been reached. This component of plot partially defines the difference between tragedy and history and their respective truths. In practice, however, literature (and not just modern and postmodern) has a great many endings which wholly or partially depart from Aristotelian completion. This is especially true of plays which, like Greek tragedy, derive from what is thought to be history. In Aristotle's favorite example, Sophocles's Oedipus, the plot is complete in that the Theban plague has been dealt with by identifying the murderer of King Laius, leaving Creon to pick up the pieces. The appearance of Antigone and Ismene and the references to Oedipus's sons, however, remind us that the story of Thebes will continue, going from bad to much worse.

Shifting quickly to Shakespeare, we see a considerable variety in the balance of present order and future disorder at the ends of the histories and tragedies. Most positively, at the end of Richard III, the victorious Richmond promises “smooth- fac'd peace, / With smiling plenty, and fair prosperous days!” (5.5.33-34). In Antony and Cleopatra, Caesar predicts that “The time of universal peace is near” (4.6.4), anticipating both the pax Augustana and the peace promised through the birth of Christ in his reign. In Hamlet and King Lear, Fortinbras and Edgar move into vacuums created by the annihilation of the ruling families and have relatively clean slates with which to work, a basically neutral situation. Henry V and Henry VI, Part 3 end with assertions of peace which are substantially qualified. Henry V has great hopes for diplomacy and marriage: “And may our oaths well kept and prosp'rous be,” a promise which the Chorus immediately reminds us is not kept (H5 5.2.374). For Edward IV, “Here I hope begins our lasting joy”; the audience remembers Richard of Gloucester's earlier soliloquy about getting the crown (3H6 5.7.46, 3.2.124-95). At the end of Richard II, the new King Henry IV faces all sorts of problems including guilt for Richard's murder, the Bishop of Carlisle's prophecy, Northumberland's possible perception of ingratitude, and Henry's “unthrifty son.” Similarly, Julius Caesar ends with a recognition of future conflict between Antony and Octavius Caesar. The extreme case, Troilus and Cressida, ends with the death of Hector, making inevitable the fall of Troy.

I wish to consider Macbeth, about which critics and directors are of two minds as to where to place the ending of the play on the spectrum of future order and disorder. Read simply, the text seems to place itself at the positive end, with peace and political legitimacy restored after Macbeth's interval of usurpation and tyranny. Some critics and directors, however, have found ways to qualify a harmonious ending by suggesting the continuity of history—that something negative necessarily or probably will follow the end of the play. I shall summarize briefly the restorative elements in the text and main arguments of the critics before considering how restoration is undercut in many of the performances available on video for research and teaching. These perfomances use the reappearance of previously established characters, primarily the Witches but also, and unhistorically, Donalbain and Fleance. Reinserting the tragic plot into its historical sources authorizes using history to comment on the results of this procedure.

Opposition to Macbeth includes three elements: the Scottish-English army, criticism of Macbeth's tyranny in both general and specific terms, and characterization of a positive alternative for Scotland. The first substantial statement of the positive comes from an anonymous Lord in act 3, scene 5. That Macbeth “holds the due of birth” from Malcolm indicates the priority of legitimate inheritance (3.5.25). From Macbeth's overthrow the Scots may again

Give to our tables meat, sleep to our nights;
Free from our feasts and banquets bloody knives;
Do faithful homage and receive free honors;
All which we pine for now.

(3.5.34-37)

These images encapsulate motifs from earlier in the play which define a vision of a restored future. As the forces assemble, Caithness adds a traditional medical metaphor:

Well, march we on
To give obedience where 'tis truly ow'd.
Meet we the med'cine of the sickly weal,
And with him pour we, in our country's purge,
Each drop of us.

(5.2.25-29)

In the next scene Macbeth ironically echoes this metaphor when he wishes the Doctor could “purge [my land] to a sound and pristine health,” which is exactly what Caithness and the others have in mind (5.3.53). As the army approaches Dunsinane, Malcolm “hope[s] the days are near at hand / That chambers will be safe,” alluding to the chamber in which Duncan and his grooms were murdered (5.4.1-2). In the closing minutes of the play, Macduff displays “th' usurper's cursed head,” asserts that “the time is free,” and addresses Malcolm: “Hail, King of Scotland!” (5.9.21, 25). This is repeated by the on-stage thanes, a positive alternative to the more problematic salutations by the Witches and others earlier in the play. It is the “faithful homage” the Lord wished for in act 3 (5.36). His “receive free honors” is realized when Malcolm creates Scotland's first earls (5.9.28-30). He then proposes to call “home our exil'd friends abroad,” mentioning no names, although Donalbain and Fleance are possibilities in the text. He also proposes justice for Macbeth's “cruel ministers,” also unnamed, although Seyton and the murderers of Banquo and Lady Macduff are possibilities. Malcolm concludes by inviting everyone to his coronation at Scone, the next step in the restoration of social and political order which have been hoped for since act 3.

A variety of critics in the last two decades have found ways of qualifying or undercutting the ending. For instance, Janet Adelman writes (or complains) that “the natural order of the end depends on this excision of the female” (145). The deaths of Lady Macduff and Lady Macbeth mean that there are no women involved in (or available for) the restoration of order, which is therefore unnatural. As a convenient recent example, Deborah Willis lists other reasons why “a truly restorative alternative for Scotland is not forthcoming” (235-36). Malcolm is young and inexperienced; his “healing” is military, not the magic of Edward the Confessor in England. She regards the creation of earls as “an empty, inflationary move,” and sees “inner tensions” in an “honor-driven patronage system controlled by the king” and dependent on “the vicissitudes of patrilinearity.” Therefore “the collaboration of witches and traitors is one of [the] predictable byproducts” of Malcolm's rule.

It is quite possible to end the play without indicating future problems. Among the video-taped performances which do so are these directed by and starring Maurice Evans (1954), Trevor Nunn with Ian McKellen (1979), and Charles Warren with Michael Jayston (1988). Many more performances make some effort to illustrate one kind of political instability at the end. The most common approach is, as Willis and others notice, to bring back the Witches. Although they have not been seen since act 4, scene 1, Macbeth refers to them constantly thereafter, including his last appearance in act 5:

[MACBETH.]
And be these juggling fiends no more believ'd,
That palter with us in a double sense,
That keep the word of promise to our ear,
And break it to our hope.

(5.8.19-22)

The present tense signals that the Witches remain alive and presumably capable of further words of promise. Macbeth's phrasing suggests that someone else may indeed believe “these juggling fiends.” Malcolm's concluding speech does not mention doing anything about them; he may not know of their existence. They certainly do not receive the fate of Margery Jordan in Henry VI, Part 2 (2.3) or the Scottish witches whose burning during the earlier reign of King Duff is recorded by Holinshed (Bullough 7.480).

The simplest approach is exemplified by John Gorrie's 1970 BBC production with Eric Porter. The last scene is set in the courtyard of the castle. As Malcolm and the new earls exit stage left, the camera pans in the opposite direction to an open door through which the Witches are looking. The camera slowly zooms to them as the credits roll. Confirmation of their presence is enough. A slightly more substantial use of the Witches is in Sarah Caldwell's Lincoln Center production (1981). The two female Witches (the third is played by a man who doubles as a soldier) enter armed as soldiers, meet at center stage during the final tableau, touch shields, and exit. Their participation in the battle has not directly influenced its outcome, but their presence indicates a contribution and implies a future role for them (also Rosenberg 654-55).

The fullest appearance by the Witches is in Arthur Allan Seidelman's Bard production (1981) in which the three Witches and their three male familiars appear on the balcony above and cheer on the Anglo-Scots army in act 5, scene 3. The Witches are back to enjoy the combat between Macbeth and Macduff. At “from his mother's womb / Untimely ripp'd,” two familiars grab Macbeth's legs, indicating the paralyzing effect of Macduff's words (5.8.15-16). During the final tableau, with Malcolm and Siward on the balcony, the Witches weave unnoticed through the crowd, signifying their permeation of the Scottish aristocracy. Two familiars climb ladders, signifying future political ambition.

Roman Polanski's film (1971) combines the Witches and Donalbain. Although the text specifies that Donalbain is not present for the assault on Dunsinane (5.2.6-7), Polanski brings him back from Ireland. After the salutation of Malcolm as king, Donalbain travels, glaring and limping like Richard III, through the rainy countryside for his own meeting with the Witches at the place where Macbeth found them in act 4 (Jorgens 168; Crowl 24; Pearlman 255; Petersen 40-41). The Witches' chanting is heard faintly. Like Macbeth, Donalbain clearly knows where and why to seek them. Several critics see the tradition of Jan Kott in this epilogue, continuing the political violence in another cycle more or less like that begun when the witches hailed Macbeth. Kott himself, however, distinguishes the “Grand Mechanism” of the English histories from the nightmare of Macbeth, from which it is possible to awaken (75-79).

I would also suggest that Polanski is giving us another bit of the historical foreshortening which characterizes the play generally. According to Holinshed, Donalbain (Donald Bane) remained in Ireland through his brother's long and generally successful reign (1057-92), but returned after his death and became king, temporarily dispossessing Malcolm's sons. Donalbain might be hailed by the Witches as “King hereafter” but follow Macbeth's view that “chance may crown me / Without my stir” (1.3.143-44). The historical King Donald was initially regarded as an improvement over Malcolm, who was thought to have brought in too many English refinements (“riotous maners and superfluous gormandizing”), a view hinted at in Macbeth's jibe about “English epicures” (Holinshed sig. P6v; 5.3.8). As several critics have pointed out, Polanski further destabilizes the accession of Malcolm by assigning the presentation of the crown to Rosse, the political opportunist whom Polanski involves in the murders of Banquo and Lady Macduff, deserting Macbeth only when he is not rewarded for the slaughter at Macduff's castle (Pearlman 254-55).

The Witches and Fleance have roles at the ends of Orson Welles's film (1948) and Jack Gold's BBC production (1983), as well as other stage productions (Piatt 23). Gold's Witches are limited to appearing briefly in silhouette before the battle. In the last scene, Macbeth's body is at the foot of the throne. Macduff has given Malcolm the crown which he has picked up after Macbeth's death. Standing over the body of Macbeth is Fleance, who has not been heard of since he escaped being murdered in act 3. He has been present for the revenge which Banquo commanded, though not directly involved (3.3.18). As he looks back to Malcolm, the camera cuts to a series of head and shoulder shots of the earls. Recognizing a threat in Fleance, Malcolm nervously lowers a little the crown he has been holding. The final shot, with ominous music, is Fleance looking back to Malcolm.

Welles's film involves the Witches in two ways and has two appearances by Fleance. The death of Macbeth is represented by the decapitation of the Witches' crowned doll, which has appeared frequently before. After the enthusiastic hailing of King Malcolm by the thanes, the camera dissolves to a long shot of the castle, then pulls back to behind the Witches with their pronged staves looking at the castle. After a dissolve to clouds, we have a medium shot of the Witches, one speaking the relocated line “Peace, the charm's wound up” (1.3.37), paltering in a double sense that their charm on Macbeth has ended and that a new one has been created.

A youthful Fleance first appears between the Holy Father and Siward when the besieging army approaches the walls of Dunsinane to be mocked by Macbeth (5.5.1-4). Siward pulls Fleance to safety as Macbeth kills the Holy Father by throwing his spearlike scepter. Later, in a jumble of images, the crown from the doll becomes Macbeth's crown, bouncing at Fleance's feet. During the enthusiastic hailing of Malcolm, there is a quick shot of Fleance holding the crown and looking impassively upward (Kliman 28, 30). If the Witches have wound up a new charm, is it for Malcolm or Fleance? The Witches predicted to Banquo that “Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none” (1.3.67). Welles and Gold suggest that Fleance will or wishes to be the fulfillment of this prophecy.

The historical problem with using Fleance emerges from Holinshed:

Fleance … fled into Wales … at length also he came into such familiar acquaintance with the said princes daughter, that she of courtesie in the end suffered him to get hir with child; which being once understood, hir father the prince conceived such hatefull displeasure towards Fleance, that he finallie slue him. …

(sigs. P2v-3; summarized by Bullough 7.499)

Although the child, known as Walter the Steward/Stewart, works out well enough, Fleance's activities in Wales suggest why Shakespeare ignores him in the second half of the play, not a reason why he might reappear at the end (cf. Rosenberg 653).

The reappearances of Donalbain and Fleance may also be regarded as surrogates for the initial difficulty King Malcolm III had establishing his rule. As Holinshed reports,

Thus while Malcolme was busied in setting orders amongst his subjects, tidings came that one Lugtake surnamed the foole, being either the sonne, or (as some write) the coosen of the late mentioned Makbeth, was conveied with a great number of such had taken part with the said Makbeth unto Scone, and there by their support received the crowne, as lawful inheritor thereto.

(sig. P4v; summarized by Bullough 7.433)

This Lugtake, or Lulach, was in fact Macbeth's stepson, the child of Lady Macbeth's first marriage to Gillacomagin, Mormaer of Maray (Bullough 7.433). If one wishes an answer to the question how many children had Lady Macbeth, at least this one. According to Holinshed, Macduff, now earl of Fife, defeated Lugtake's forces and killed him in 1058. Macduff turns out to be more reliable than the two Thanes of Cawdor.

In these performances, the other potential problems seen by recent critics such as Adelman and Willis do not appear and would be difficult to justify historically. For example, Willis's contrasting the magic healing of King Edward the Confessor needs tempering by the fact that Edward's death left an unsettled political situation leading the Norman Conquest in 1066. Adelman's view about “eliminating the female” (146), especially in any positive sense, might be balanced by knowledge that Malcolm married the woman now known as St. Margaret of Scotland, whose chapel may be seen at Edinburgh Castle (Mackay). Three of her six sons eventually reigned in Scotland; a daughter and a granddaughter were queens of England. I am not aware of a production which introduces her, but she could appear in some of act 4, scene 3, with Malcolm in England where he first met her, or in the last scene. A similar expansion of a woman's role is in Richard Loncraine's recent film of Richard III, in which Princess Elizabeth of York is on camera frequently throughout; her wedding is celebrated and consummated just before the ultimate battle.

Contemporary critics who see many possible kinds of instability as the consequence of the end of Macbeth represent a widespread tendency to suspect the promises and performances of political leaders. Some of these suspicions appear in many productions using the Witches, Donalbain, and Fleance to blur the distinction between the ending of a tragic plot and the continuity of history. Consideration of Shakespeare's historical sources suggests the limits to some of these stagings.

Works Cited

Adelman, Janet. Suffocating Mothers: Fantasies of Maternal Origin in Shakespeare's Plays, Hamlet to The Tempest. New York: Routledge, 1992.

Aristotle. Poetics. Trans. W. Hamilton Fyfe. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1932.

Bullough, Geoffrey, ed. Narrative and Dramatic Sources of Shakespeare. Vol. 7. London: Routledge; New York: Columbia UP, 1973.

Caldwell, Sarah, dir. Macbeth. With Philip Anglim. Lincoln Center/WNET, 1981. Videocassette. Films for the Humanities, n.d.

Crowl, Samuel. Shakespeare Observed: Studies in Performance on Stage and Screen. Athens: Ohio UP, 1994.

Evans, Maurice, dir. Macbeth. With Evans. Hallmark, 1954. Videocassette. Video Dimensions, n.d.

Gold, Jack, dir. Macbeth. With Nicol Williamson. 1983. Videocassette. BBC/Time-Life TV.

Gorrie, John, dir. Macbeth. With Eric Porter. 1970. Videocassette. BBC/Time-Life TV, 1976.

Holinshed, Raphael. The History of Scotland. London, 1585.

Jorgens, Jack. Shakespeare on Film. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1997.

Kliman, Bernice W. “Welles's Macbeth, a Textual Parable.” Skovmand 25-37.

Kott, Jan. Shakespeare Our Contemporary. Trans. Boleslaw Taborski. Garden City: Doubleday, 1964.

Mackay, Aeneas James Gordon. “St. Margaret.” Dictionary of National Biography.

Nunn, Trevor, dir. Macbeth. With Ian McKellen. Royal Shakespeare Company/Thames Television, 1979. Videocassette. Films for the Humanities, 1988.

Pearlman, E. “Macbeth on Film: Politics.” Shakespeare and the Moving Image: The Plays on Film and Television. Ed. Anthony Davies and Stanley Welles. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1994. 250-60.

Petersen, Per Serritslev. “The ‘Bloody Business’ of Roman Polanksi's Macbeth: A Case Study of the Dynamics of Modern Shakespeare Appropriation.” Skovmand 38-53.

Piatt, Richard J. Jr. Rev. of Macbeth with Stacy Keach. Shakespeare Theater, Washington, D.C., Sept. 12-Nov. 5, 1995. Shakespeare Bulletin 13.4 (1995): 23-24.

Polanski, Roman, dir. Macbeth. With Jon Finch. 1971. Videocassette. Columbia Tristar Home Video, 1986.

Rosenberg, Marvin. The Masks of Macbeth. Berkeley: U of California P, 1978.

Seidelman, Arthur Allan, dir. Macbeth. With Jeremy Brett. Videocassette. Bard Productions, 1981.

Skovmand, Michael, ed. Screen Shakespeare, Dolphin 24. Aarhus: Aarhus UP, 1994.

Warren, Charles, dir. Macbeth. With Michael Jayston. Thames Television, 1988. Videocassette. HBO Video, n.d.

Welles, Orson, dir. Macbeth. With Welles. 1948. Videocassette. Republic Pictures Home Video, 1993.

Willis, Deborah. Malevolent Nuture: Witch-Hunting and Maternal Power in Early Modern England. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1995.