Tomorrow, and Tomorrow — The Macbeths’ Final Farewell

Of the handful of uber-famous speeches in Macbeth, the one that most often quoted is the “Tomorrow, and tomorrow” speech. There’s certainly a lot of pathos to chew on, and myriad ways to perform it (famously, Ian McKellan reportedly told Patrick Stewart to focus on the ‘and’s). Often taken as an existential lament, it’s usually recited with a bitterly sorrowful intonation.

Having played the role for one theatre or another every year for the last 17 years, I can tell you that’s not wrong. But it’s not right either. It loses context. And…