Review: Davidsen, Kelsey Thrill in Met Opera's New Macbeth Season Opener

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There’s not an ounce of humanity in any of the three principals at the core of Verdi’s MACBETH, in a new production by Louisa Proske in her Met debut, which opened the company’s new season Tuesday night. It’s a great reflection of our times.

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The opera plays its way out as a kind of “film noir,” with dark action that builds feverishly during the course of the evening, with the score’s details brought out smartly by the Met Orchestra under Music Director Yannick Nezet-Seguin and choreography by Jorrell Lawyer-Jefferson in his Met debut.

The mostly monotone sets by Jon Bausor (lighting by Adam Silverman) and costumes by Montana Levi Blanco seem the perfect representation of the action, somewhat like watching a black-and-white crime movie from the ‘40s. A kind of “The Macbeths Always Ring Twice.”

Ice water runs through the veins of soprano Lise Davidsen’s Lady Macbeth, even when her voice is at its most delectable. While she loses her cool in the opera’s famous sleepwalking aria, “ Una macchia è qui tuttora!” ( "Yet here's a spot"), she had to be unconscious in order to do it. Her towering figure (over six-feet tall) dominates simply by its presence, though there’s much more to her portrayal, with her oh-so-calm demeanor that is never out of control, always ready to help with the evil plans the couple has set down, when her husband falters for a moment. (E.g., “ Trionfai!” (“ I have triumphed!”)

With her endless calm, she is a fine foil for the overwrought Macbeth (“Macbetto” in the libretto) of baritone Quinn Kelsey, who slips in and out of fury and remorse, terror and fear, less in control than she but exactly what the role calls for. He too was in fine, strong voice for the opening, though Davidsen is hard to compete with, even after her death, when it came to holding the audience in the palm of his hand. Still, he knows how to be terrifying (he was the most scary Pere Germont in TRAVIATA I've ever seen) came across at every opportunity, e.g., “ Pietà, rispetto, amore” ("Compassion, honour, love").

They are an excellent pairing, showing as much warmth for each other as they might treat strangers in the street. Love doesn’t keep them together; ambition does, as they outline in the duet, “ Ora di morte e di vendetta” ("Hour of death and of vengeance") and elsewhere.

It’s interesting to note that, according to Gary Wills’s book, “Verdi’s Shakespeare,” Verdi wanted the least appealing of performers as the couple and was determined to break away from “the tyranny of good singing.” Wills remarks that the first Lady Macbeth, Marianna Barbieri-Nini, had “strikingly bad looks,” because he didn’t want “a beautiful woman striking beautiful poses.” If that was the ideal for the character, Davidsen “failed” dismally, looking particularly stunning in her white bed clothes.

Okay. The Macbeths are two major characters. Who’s the third? There are plenty of fine performers in other main roles, particularly bass-baritone Ryan Speedo Green’s notable Banco/Banquo, another leader of the Scottish army, with his aria “ Come dal ciel precipita” ("O, how the darkness falls from heaven") and tenor Freddie de Tommaso’s Macduff, a smaller yet standout role for the singer, as an early, speculater of Macbeth’s role in the king’s death, with a wonderful aria, “ Ah, la paterna mano” ("Ah, the paternal hand"). But neither of them can be called the dramatic equals of the Macbeths.

Other main roles are soprano Marcy Stonikas as the lady in waiting, tenor Jonathan Burton as Malcolm and bass-baritone Jeongcheol Chas as a servant.

No. The third “principal”—according to composer Verdi and his librettists Francesco Maria Piave and Andrea Maffei—is the coven of witches, the “Weird Sisters,” who are never out of sight or certainly out of mind, as they hover over the proceedings in varying places and sized groupings. This is one of the big changes from the original Shakespeare, who confined his witches (“Double, double toil and trouble…”) to a trio and restricted their appearances to a minimum, as manipulators of the action and the fate of Scotland.

I must say that I found as costumed by designer Blanco, it was a bit difficult to tell that these were the “weird sisters” of the libretto. Their acting and singing may be dead on, the ultimate enablers, like some kind of modern political party, but their look was a bit vague for such a specific type of role. Nonetheless, the singers of the Met chorus did wonderfully, both the woman and men, under chorus master Timan Michael.

Though Piave and Maffei made some significant changes in the libretto from Shakespeare’s play, they did keep many of the tricks that the Bard planted in the work, like the admonition that Macbeth could only be killed by someone who was “not of woman born” (Macduff was a Caesarean delivery) or that his castle can be taken only by an assault from “Birnham Wood” (the soldiers cut branches from the Wood to hide their approach to the castle).

Except for Lady Macbeth's chamber, this may be one of the less ornate productions in recent times at the Met, but it is absolutely right. I’d be happy to see it again—certainly with as good a cast as was mustered for the gala opening.

Caption: Soprano Lise Davidsen

Credit: Marty Sohl/The Met

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_Originally reported by [BroadwayWorld](https://www.broadwayworld.com/bwwopera/article/Review-Making-Scotland-Great-Again-with-Thrilling-Davidsen-and-Kelsey-in-Mets-New-MACBETH-20260923)._