i’ve seen people laughing at the small talk vibes of “o? By whom?” In Macbeth and how no amounts of shock and horror can overcome it, but i have a proposition: anger. Malcom should go suddenly still when he hears the news, “O? By whom?” Should be uttered with a hand clenched around a knife/sword or screamed in rage as a son desperately wants to know who killed his father. Lennox should be holding him down as he tells Malcom what he knows, then Malcom deflating when Macbeth says that he has killed the supposed murderers. After this, Malcom should be staring at the floor with tears in his eyes, distracted, until his conversation with Donalbain where Malcom’s lines can be read tearfully.
this makes the “no mercy left” line hit much harder as a miserable Malcom renounces Scotland and runs away.
