​The three weird witches cast a spell over magnificent Macbeth - Susan Morrison

Ralph Fiennes and Indira Varma as Lord and Lady Macbeth in the current producuction of the ‘Scottish Play’ at the Royal Highland Centre on the outskirts of Edinburgh (Picture Matt Humphrey)

Last Wednesday I had a little son-and-mum time with the lad. We were going to see Macbeth. Very cultural.

​ As it happens, my lad is keen on Shakespeare, and MaccyB is one of his favourites. Well, it's everyones, really isn’t it?

For Shakespeare it pretty much rips along and the action is fairly clear to follow. There are still those Bill Shakespeare moments of long, long sentences that, frankly, could have been red-penned.

Things along the lines of, and this isn’t an exact quote, “My liege fast approaching through dark dales and storm tossed roads do ride an armoured host with evil intent come armed to face your royal self at dawn with flared nostrils and narrowed eyes”.

Rough translation, the bad guys are coming, they’re seriously tooled up and should be here in the morning, weather permitting.

Oh, and their noses and eyes look a bit weird. Possibly have colds.

The action is swift and fairly bloody and we can take valuable life lessons from the fate of Macbeth and his missus.

For one thing, don’t listen to three random women who turn up to yell unsolicited career advice at you and for another, lay off writing that to your wife about it. If ever a woman went from model spouse to murderous banshee at the drop of a note, it’s Lady MacB.

Hostess of the year she is not. Quite happy to murder people under her own roof.

Good grief, when I have people just coming to dinner I become paranoid about whether or not there’s loo roll in the bog. Perhaps that’s what threw her over the edge. She’d forgotten to change the sheets on the guest beds and couldn't face the shame at breakfast, so decided to just butcher everyone instead.

So Wednesday, matinee. Off we went. Very quiet when we got there. Odd. Also no-one taking the cash for the parking. Big red flag right there that something was amiss.

The tickets were for Thursday. My son was very good and said at least we’d had a nice run to the airport.

I shouldn’t be allowed out on my own, although clearly, I can get up to mischief even when accompanied.

We did make it, and on the right day. And it was worth it. Reviews have been glowing and you can see why.

Possibly like me, you were introduced to Shakespeare in English class. Books were slung at you and people were picked on to read the parts.

One of my mildly sadistic English teachers particularly liked giving boys the girls parts, because as he said, that’s what happened in Elizabethan theatre. Which is true, but the lads of the Kings Players didn’t have to contend with being called “Juliet” all playtime after class.

It also meant that the girls had nothing to do but listen to the likes of Andrew Millar drone out long, long sentences (see above).

If you’d managed to bag a seat by the radiator, then those lessons quickly became a snoozefest. It's where I learned to doze with my eyes open.

To see and hear Shakespeare performed by a cast that really knows what they’re doing was wonderful. It was a magnificent production.

Ralph Fiennes and Indira Varma were outstanding, but for me the weird sisters totally bewitched us and stole the show.