Giuseppe Verdi’s opera “Macbeth,” which closely follows Shakespeare’s original, centers on a man, his wife and their unquenchable — and doomed — quest for power. “What makes it great to me is the arc of the man Macbeth himself,” explains Helena Binder, who is stage directing the Opera North production.“It’s not a prophecy that makes him do what he does, it’s not the power of Lady Macbeth. It’s the suggestion that causes him, and human nature, to create his own destiny.”
 
And the Opera North production aims at delivering that human quality. “I cast Macbeth and Lady Macbeth looking for humans rather than larger-than-life characters,” says Louis Burkot, the regional professional opera’s artistic director, who is conducting. “I really wanted both of them to be vulnerable humans so that we care about them,” he says.