KINDRED SPIRIT TO `MACBETH'.

``Mom and Dad, I've decided I want to be an actor.''

Such words have torpedoed the hopes of many a well-meaning parent yearning for a secure, reasonably profitable life for a child. Welcome Msomi's father first heard them when Welcome was a 13-year-old South African schoolboy and first-time actor-director.

``I had just read `Julius Caesar' and asked my schoolmaster if I could do it,'' the younger Msomi recalled recently from his home in Johannesburg. ``I played Marc Antony, and it was so exciting that my dream of becoming a doctor ended immediately.

``I thought, `I could never get that kind of applause doing anything else.' ''

Despite his father's misgivings, Msomi, now 53, has gone on to achieve a rich life in the theater. His primary vehicle has been a much-heralded bicultural creation called ``Umabatha.''

Subtitled ``The Zulu Macbeth,'' the vibrant theater piece sets Shakespeare's great murder tragedy amid the warrior society of the early-19th-century Zulu tribal nation in what is now South Africa.

Featuring muscular martial dance - driven by a booming on-stage drummer - and Zulu-style declamatory acting, the show premiered at Natal in 1971 and quickly leapt to a slot in England's august Royal Shakespeare Company's season the following year. It has since won over audiences at festivals and major theater centers throughout the Western world.

This week, as part of a U.S. tour, ``Umabatha'' comes to Southern California with stops at the Wiltern Theatre in Los Angeles Thursday through Sunday and Orange County's Irvine Barclay Theatre on Monday, presented by the Philharmonic Society.

``Umabatha'' was born after Msomi's first play about apartheid life in black South African townships earned him the attention of the press and academics and also a rare invitation to enroll at the overwhelmingly white Natal University.

Msomi wanted to write a play based on the history of great African nations of the early 1800s, and a professor suggested he base it on well-known Western literary epics. When Msomi encountered one of these, ``Macbeth,'' he discovered strong parallels between Shakespeare's tale of an ambitious Scottish thane and the life of the powerful warrior-statesman, Shaka, who was eventually murdered by family members and one of his closest counselors.

``All the elements in `Macbeth' fit very well,'' Msomi said, admitting, however, that there is a humor in ``Umabatha'' that one doesn't find in the usual dark ``Macbeth'' production.

```Macbeth' is a gory tale of blood and death,'' Msomi acknowledged matter-of-factly. ``We have all that in `Umabatha,' but there are moments of humor and laughter which are celebrated with music and dance. In our tradition, even in death we find humor.''

From the start, the main purpose of the project was to shed light on Zulu culture and history, rather than to glean new insights from Shakespeare's tragedy.

``My aim was to show the richness of my culture,'' Msomi said. ``The show has proven to a lot of people the need to use the theater to show our pride in that culture, to show that we don't have to be ashamed of who we are.''

What: ``Umabatha: The Zulu Macbeth.''

Where: Wiltern Theatre, 3790 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles.

When: 8 p.m. today and Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday. Also, 8 p.m. Monday at Irvine Barclay Theatre, University of California, Irvine.

Tickets: $30, $35 and $38 ($11 for UCLA students with valid full-time ID). Call [phone].

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Photo: Shakespeare's tale of treachery and murder takes on the characteristics of South African Zulu culture in ``Umabatha,'' playing at the Wiltern Theatre.