Joel Coen says his solo directorial The Tragedy of Macbeth is a fresh take on William Shakespeare's play

Filmmaker Joel Coen’’s upcoming take on William Shakespeare’’s classic Macbeth is titled The Tragedy of Macbeth.

The director, who has made some of the most critically-acclaimed films such as Fargo, The Big Lebowski and No Country For Old Men with his brother Ethan Coen, is going solo for the new project.

The film will feature his wife, actor Frances McDormand and Denzel Washington in the lead.

Talking to Film Stage along with Joel, McDormand said the new adaptation will be different from the previous iterations of the famous play.

“I think a very important thing about Joel’s adaptation is that we are not calling it Macbeth. We’re calling it The Tragedy of Macbeth, which I think is an important distinction. In Joel’s adaptation, we are exploring the age of the characters and our adaptation the Macbeths are older.

“Both Denzel and I are older than what is often cast as the Macbeths. We’re postmenopausal, we’re past childbearing age. So that puts a pressure on their ambition to have the crown. I think the most important distinction is that it is their last chance for glory,” the Oscar-winning actor said.

Joel described the new take as a thriller.

“I think that is something that I’ve always sort of felt when watching the play and also something that became more clear and more interesting to me as I was getting into it and doing the adaptation.

“It’s interesting how Shakespeare sort of pre-figured certain tropes in American thriller and crime literature that were common in the early part of the 20th century,” he said.

Joel said the echoes of the Shakespearean story, which follows an ambitious Scottish general and his scheming wife, has often been felt in American crime fiction.

“That kind of fiction I used to read as a kid. I thought it would be interesting to bring certain aspects of that to the production of the movie,” he added.

Produced by A24 and Scott Rudin, The Tragedy of Macbeth will also feature Brendan Gleeson and Corey Hawkins.