A soldier's tale.

"THE SCOTTISH PLAY" CALLS TO MIND witches and ghosts, superstition over saying the play's title in a theatre, and famous quotes like "Out, damned spot!" along with regicide and its aftermath. But director Eric Ting is undaunted by historic stagings of Macbeth. He reimagines the Bard's classic, Jan. 18-Feb. 12, at Long Wharf Theatre, where he is associate artistic director.

In Macbeth 1969, Ting casts the three witches as nurses in a Midwestern hospital on Christmas Eve during the Vietnam war. Macbeth and Banquo become veterans returning home. "The roles have been conflated so there are only six actors," explains Ting, adding that he and his team were inspired by images of shell-shocked soldiers from World War I who were sent to convalesce in idyllic British countryside settings. "The trauma of war is carried inside of them wherever they go," says Ting. "As long as there is war, soldiers will return home and have trouble reintegrating into society and connecting with their loved ones. No one is immune to it." --Eliza Bent