Macbeth, by William Shakespeare
Jacobean Tragedy
Macbeth—prompted by the prophecies of three witches and pressured by his wife—murders King Duncan and begins a bloody reign as king of Scotland. Despite their best efforts, the Macbeths are unable to escape their crimes. Duncan’s son, Malcolm leads a revolt, Lady Macbeth goes mad, and, in the final fulfillment of the witches’ prophesies, Macbeth is killed by Macduff.

Ubu Roi, by Alfred Jarry
Proto-Modernist Farce
Jarry draws heavily from Macbeth for his play’s story and principal characters. The buffoon Père Ubu—egged on by his wife and his own unbridled greed—slaughters King Wenceslas and ascends the throne of Poland. After a murderous run by the Ubus, Wenceslas’ son, the 14-year-old Bougrelas leads an uprising against Père Ubu and eventually regains the throne.

The Polish Play, devised by Henry Wishcamper
Theatrical Mashup
The Polish Play takes the stories and texts of these two source plays and fuses them together to tell the single, new story of Père Ubu’s bloody ascension to the throne of Poland, his reign of terror, and his disgraceful fall from power.