Reviewed by James Karas
WELCOME TO THE NEW WORLD
The National Theatre of Greece has staged a production of the three plays, Agamemnon, Libation Bearers and Eumenides that make up Aeschylus’ Oresteia trilogy in the Theatro Dassous in Thessaloniki. This is the only extant trilogy from Ancient Greece, and it was played in one evening lasting over three hours without intermission. It is a major theatrical event. The trilogy is rarely performed on the same evening. I saw all three parts in the same theatre in 2019, but they were done over two evenings and were directed by different directors.
Director and dramaturge Theodoros Terzopoulos brings his own take on the great trilogy that inevitably needs adaptations, changes and deletions to make it palatable to modern audiences. We do not know enough about Ancient Greek music and dance to approach the original opera-type production and must rely on modern ideas. Terzopoulos has many of them.
The Oresteia is universally acknowledged as one of the greatest dramatic works in the west. It tells the story of The House of Atreus, specifically about the return of King Agamemnon of Argus, the victorious commander-in chief of the Greek forces that won the Trojan War and destroyed the city of Troy.
Agamemnon returns to Argos with his trophy, Princess Cassandra, where his bitter wife Clytemnestra slays him. Her son Orestes avenges the killing of his father by killing his mother and her lover Augustus. He is in turn pursued by the avenging Furies and in the last play he ends up in court in Athens where the goddess Athena pardons him and establishes a system of justice for the great city. It is a long and great story that has travelled over thousands of years.
Agamemnon begins memorably with a tired old Watchman (Tasos Dimas) on the roof of the Palace of Argos complaining about his fate and telling us that he is watching for a light signal that is to be sent to Argos from Troy announcing the Greek victory over the Trojans. The light signal is sent from mountain peak to mountain peak across hundreds of kilometers, a feat of imagination and planning if there ever was one.
As the Watchman relates his story in measured emphatic tones, the Chorus of Argives, dressed in black, enters the round playing area of the Theatro Dassous in slow steps, stop and face each other. The lengthy choral episode that follows in the text is eliminated as Clytemnestra (Sophia Hill), the Husband Slayer enters imperiously. She wants us to believe that she is the much-suffering faithful wife and tells us how Agamemnon slew their daughter Iphigenia in order to appease the gods and get a fair wind to sail off to Troy with the Greek forces. Hill plays an unforgettable Clytemnestra.
The Chorus does engage in Dialogue with Clytemnestra, but its use is limited. The Chorus lie or roll on the ground, they engage is some heavy breathing or grunting and perform some arm gestures and movements but there is almost no chanting of the great verses that Aeschylus wrote for them. They do engage in vigorous argument over the guilt of Orestes’ murder of his mother but that is near the end.
Agamemnon (Savvas Stroumpos) and Aegisthus (David Malteze) speak in enunciatory tones but are given a maniacal laugh that I found curious. Why does the commander-in-chief of the Greek forces sound slightly unhinged? And why does his cuckolder Aegisthus sound the same? Otherwise, they give impressive performances.
The poor Cassandra (Evelyn Assouad), the Trojan princess who is brought by Agamemnon as his concubine, is first shown lying at his feet. He stands on a raised part of the stage announcing his return and she lies on the steps at his feet. During her scene she crawls along the ground and tells us her story very dramatically. A stunning performance by Assouad.
Orestes (Babis Alefantis) is a young man ready to defend his murder of his mother. But the Furies cannot forgive such egregious crimes, and they intend to punish him. The Chorus turns into Furies (Erinyes), gesticulating, falling and rolling on the ground, waving their hair, grunting menacingly and turning into vengeful creatures.
In The Eumenides, the final play of the trilogy, Orestes is brought to trial in Athens before an Athenian citizen (Tasos Dimas) with Apollo (Nikos Dasis) and Athena (Aglaia Pappas). The Ghost of Clytemnestra (Sophia Hill again) appears for the prosecution. As is well known, the end of The Eumenides has a political angle. It was as much a salute to the establishment of a system of justice in Athens as to a winding up of the story of The House of Atreus. The Furies or Erinyes are turned into the kindly Eumenides.
Except for a few characters dressed in white, the costumes are strictly black. My only comment is that Orestes is not part of the Chorus and he should have a costume differentiating him from them.
Terzopoulos makes the ending of his production of The Oresteia into a powerful political statement of his own. When the trilogy finishes, we hear a loud announcement in English: WELCOME TO THE NEW WORLD. What follows, still in English, was a recitation of American financial successes such the price index increases of S & P, the New York Stock Exchange and the like. All are intended to be vigorously anti-American. That explained the singing of a song in Arabic during the performance that I did not get.
The audience gave the production a tumultuous round of applause and started chanting. I could not get the words initially, but they soon became clearer. They were all chanting FREE PALESTINE. Terzopoulos was making a no-holds-barred political statement.
The production, however translated and dramaturged by Eleni Varopoulou and the numerous behind-the-scenes artists, represents the vision of The Oresteia of Terzopoulos. It is a coherent vision (politics aside) that may not satisfy everyone in every respect. That is inevitable considering the complexity of the work, the theatre for which it was written two and a half thousand years ago and the twenty-first century.
It is worth mentioning that the production opened in Budapest in May 6, 2025 and then travelled to China, around Greece and it will finish its tour in Aeschylus’s birthplace, Elefsina, in September. That is a total of 12 venues in four months with one or two performances in each theatre.
I saw the performance at the Theatro Dassous in Thessaloniki on July 17, 2025
No comments:
Post a Comment