With a New York International Fringe Festival award for Innovation and Originality under its tiny belt, the Tiny Ninja Theatre's Macbeth will continue on at the Present Company Artspace Sept. 6-Oct. 1 in a Wednesday through Saturday run.

Director Dov Weinstein, who founded the Tiny Ninja company in 1999, manipulates the assorted plastic vending machine figures who recite William Shakespeare's great tragedy of murder and ambition. Mr. and Mrs. Smile will be playing Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, three green aliens are the witches, and various ninjas fill the rest of the roles. Weinstein plays the porter himself.

Because of the small scale of the production, only 10 seats are available per performance. But tininess doesn't mean tiny production values; there are plenty of lighting effects for storms and the weird sister scenes, a tiny floating dagger and spinning apparitions.

In a released statement, Weinstein assured skeptics, "I think it's safe to say that this is Macbeth as it was meant to be seen, performed by Tiny Ninjas on a briefcase-sized stage. If tiny plastic ninjas had existed in the 17th century, I have no doubt that Shakespeare himself would have staged the play in this way."

Tickets are $12. The Present Company Artspace is located at 196 Staton Street between Ridge and Attorney. For information and reservations, call (212) 420-8877. -- By Christine Ehren