WHEN Greg Hicks first performed as Macbeth with a group called the Raving Beauties in 1989, critics were swift to stick in the dagger. “Hicks plays him from the start as a zombie,” wrote one journalist. “His soliloquies in particular give the impression of a man who is not so much valour’s minion as Valium’s slave.”

“I was a little traumatised at the time,” Hicks confesses. “Although I was thrilled to tackle the role, I was completely unequipped to deal with it.”

Who could have predicted that 26 years later Hicks would have evolved into one of Britain’s most fiercely distinctive interpreters of Shakespeare? His disdainful scowl, muscular verse-speaking and taut physicality have made him an arresting presence in recent Royal Shakespeare Company productions. As Coriolanus, in David Farr’s samurai-style interpretation of the tragedy, Hicks played his character’s flawed heroism with such persuasive vigour that one critic hailed him as “one of the most complete Shakespearean actors in Britain”.

More recently — as the ghost in Michael Boyd’s Hamlet — he ditched the ectoplasm-and-armour approach, memorably portraying Hamlet’s father as a gaunt, half- naked figure, racked by purgatorial agony and emanating danger with every swipe of his broadsword.

On stage Hicks’s face is sharply delineated, with every emotion brought into stern focus. His voice has a clear-cut resonance, with mordant overtones that suggest he would happily drink vinegar for breakfast. It is striking, therefore, when we meet at the RSC’s Covent Garden offices, that off-stage he is affable, while his face has much more gentle contours. Wirily agile, he wears his 50 years lightly.

He is here to talk about returning to the role of Macbeth in Dominic Cooke’s production at the RSC. The play is transferring to London after receiving mixed reviews in Stratford in March. It is one of many reasons that he declares: “2004 was a deeply difficult year for me — even though the highlight was getting married. At the beginning of the year I was not only rehearsing Macbeth, but I was also playing Jesus (in Messiah at the Old Vic) with Steven Berkoff, whom I deeply admire. It didn’t sit too easily with a day’s rehearsal of Macbeth . I think, if you’re at all unsteady, playing Macbeth can be very toxic.”

Although both productions were given a lukewarm reception, Hicks himself was declared by one critic to be a “mesmerising” Jesus, while his performance as Macbeth was heralded as an example of “piercing, febrile theatrical intelligence”.

Yet Hicks’s emphasis of the difficulties of both roles proves characteristic of a man who seems more wary of praise than of criticism. The idea that he has struggled is very important to him, and he freely concedes that in the past he was far too wedded to the idea of “the tortured, volatile, mad, heavy-drinking artist”. The heavy drinking stopped last year, and there are many ways in which the struggle has proved positive, not least in his openness to learning new skills by adopting disciplines from other cultures. Explaining how he prepares physically for a role, he reveals: “I practise capoeira, an Afro-Brazilian martial art. It’s practised in pairs, and it’s dangerous, provocative, sexy and funny.”

Hicks is anxious about sounding too luvvie about his physical work, but it is obvious that it is very important to him. He describes himself as growing up “stiff-hipped, stiff-hearted and stiff-headed”.

“I’m a typical example of an only child from a lower-middle-class background, with lots of neuroses about selfexpression and self-esteem,” he says.

Bullfighting and the Rolling Stones were the two initial outlets for Hicks as an emotionally repressed teenager.However, it was at prep school in Leicester, where he played Shylock at the age of 11, and at Oakham public school, where he played Malvolio, that teachers started telling Hicks that his future was in theatre.

“Much to my father’s disappointment,” he reveals. “He used to be the champion trader of Leicester Market. It was his drive to give me this incredible education, and it’s only in the past 15 years that he’s come round to the fact that I could be a good actor.” Now Hicks relates happily how his Dad, 93, gives him “marks out of ten” for each performance.

Earlier, other figures supported his career — not least Sir Peter Hall. “When I was much younger at the National, he used to send me these notes saying, in essence, ‘I’m watching you’. He really validated me. We’ve since collaborated brilliantly on projects such as Oedipus Rex and Tantalus. He likes what I do, and I find him absolutely gracious.”

How does Hicks feel now about returning to Macbeth with two other Macbeths in London, one starring Simon Russell Beale? “I dared myself to go and see the Max Stafford-Clark production (at Wilton’s Music Hall) because the reviews were spectacular, and it’s so far from what we’re doing. I don’t choose to see Simon’s because it’s too close. I think it would not be productive at this point.”

What would be productive? Is he changing his own performance in any way? His eyes flash. “Only internally. During the run in Stratford I got better — and there’s more to come, I hope.”

• Macbeth previews at the Albery Theatre, WC2 (0870 0606621), from tomorrow

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