Orestes. a Tragic Slam-dunk

or “Euripedes, Eumenides!”
by Gina Guglielmo

Orestes, a Tragic Romp, a World Premier now playing at the Folger Theatre until March 7, is un-predictably the surprise smash of the year. Directed by the Super Theatre Mensch, Aaron Posner, using the transadaptation of Anne Washburn, the performance delights and inspires from start to finish.
Greek drama is daunting to teach or present to realistic, savvy and cynical audiences of today. A few….er, odd traditions present stumbling blocks. Start with the Chorus, a group of citizens and a leader who hang around the stage lamenting, berating, narrating background and always imploring the gods to clean up the hero’s mess. These prayers effectively bring down one or another of the Olympians in a device called “Deus ex Machina” lamely rendered as “The God on a Pulley” since in earlier times the divinity was lowered thus onto the stage and with a wave of his/her wand, solved the thorniest problems.
Woody Allen finessed the chorus problem in “Mighty Aphrodite” by inserting scenes in which mummy-like figures berated the main character Lenny for his total ineptness:”Lenny, don’t be a schmuck!” This example of gods/man interaction occurs later in the film:

Greek Chorus: Oh my God! It's more serious than we thought! Greek Chorus Leader: It's very serious! Her marriage to Lenny is in crisis! Greek Chorus: With the passage of time, even the strongest bonds become fragile! Greek Chorus Leader: Great, fellas, it sounds like a fortune cookie! Greek Chorus: Oh, Zeus! Most potent of gods! We implore thee! We need your help! Zeus! Great Zeus! Hear us! Hear us! We call out to thee! Zeus: Um, this is Zeus. I'm not home right now, but you can leave a message and I'll get back to you. Please start speaking at the tone. [beep] Greek Chorus: Call us when you get in. We need help!

The “Deus ex Machina”, Zeus, here does a booming voice-over as crashing as
the Almighty’s in Monty Python’s “Holy Grail.”

Posner’s solution to these archaic practices is to use a group of young women as the chorus of Argives who chant, sing, and dance with the vivacity or anguish the situation demands. Their clarion voices intoning the odes make James Suggs’ original music an integral part of the dialogue. Likewise, the god Apollo comes to the rescue in a clear, soprano voice from the wings to the great relief of Electra, Orestes and Pylades who were at the point of executing themselves as Argos had decreed.

Another practice of the original Greek drama was the use of only three actors to play all the roles, which required very precise scene ordering so the actor could change his appearance. In Orestes Holly Twyford doubles as Electra and Tyndareus, her own grandfather; Jay Sullivan plays a frenzied Orestes and the messenger who brings his death sentence; and Chris Genebach morphs into four different characters: Helen of Troy, Menelaus, Pylades and a Trojan Slave. All of these transformations were believable except for Genebach’s cameo as Helen: this woman never launched any ships, but his was a game effort .
Euripides’ play was the most popular work of the classical world, but it fell out of favor until modern times. Washburn admits that most people found it “peculiar, ignoble, largely immoral and the ending inexplicable.” She also asserts that it is funny, ironic and harrowing, a daring experimentation with the genre truly combining tragedy and romp. The comedy is strangely contemporary, but lest I give too much away, I can only cite one example. When Euripedes tells us a certain politician speaks not so much because he has something to say, but rather “to be known to have spoken” certain figures in the political world immediately come to mind.

Posner speaks of building bridges between our world and the ancient Greek cosmos.. How did that world look? sound? feel? What kind of music makes sense? Clothes? Energy? The director grappled with all these questions and came up with near-perfect answers. The play moves along uninterrupted by any intermission, reckless at times but always tremendously unified and controlled. Without explicitly stating the connection the story makes with our times, we feel a bond with these characters’ lives, their religion, and their culture. In the playwright’s words, Orestes is “relentlessly modern”

Lunchtime with Aaron Posner

In eleven years of association with the Folger Theatre, Aaron Posner has become a docent favorite, thanks to productions such as Twelfth Night, Measure for Measure, and last year’s Macbeth, and thanks also to his engaging, frank and articulate discussions with us. He did not disappoint on January 19, when he took an hour off from rehearsals of Orestes: A Tragic Romp, an adaptation of Euripedes’ play by contemporary playwright Anne Washburn, which will run January 27 to March 7.

“It’s really exciting to direct a play by Euripedes with the author in the room,” he began, to general laughter, noting that Washburn has been an active participant in the rehearsal process. Orestes was a play she studied in college, and she always wanted to see it performed. As with most Greek drama, the existing translations are either academic and literal or highly poetic. Contemporary working playwrights, when adapting Greek drama, usually use the original story as a springboard to their own concerns. In this case, though, Washburn’s adaptation is quite close to the original. “Anne has brushed the dust off the play and updated the language,” said Aaron, “but the humor, the moral ambiguity, and the energy of the play are Euripedes’ own.”
A big challenge of Greek tragedy, for Aaron, is how to tell the story without “overwrought weeping and wailing.” He liked Washburn’s adaptation immediately, because her dry caustic tone puts the action at something of an ironic remove, without being too clever. “We talk a lot in rehearsal about the line between clever and good,” said Aaron. “Good to me means provoking a conversation about the play’s ideas and conflicts. ‘Who am I? How did I get here from there?’ are fascinating questions, whether you’re in therapy or watching Greek drama, and I want the ideas out front.”

Aaron is setting the action in an imagined, created world that represents no particular time period, though the audience may detect Greek overtones in the costumes and set. (The floor of the stage is covered in stones, an idea Aaron had one day while sitting on the gravel of the Folger’s Elizabethan Garden.) The music, written for the show by frequent collaborator James Sugg, is influenced by everything from pop to gospel to classical, but does not refer directly to any genre. It will be sung by a five-member, female “chorus.” The production will also feature ironic, cross-dressing doubling in the cast—for example, Holly Twyford plays both Electra and Electra’s grandfather. In a nod to the Greek practice of using masks, most of the minor doubled characters wear glasses.

“This is as hard as anything I’ve ever done,” Aaron confessed. “How to integrate the over-the-top tragedy, the music and movement and rhythm in ways that aren’t just ridiculous to a modern audience is a constant challenge. It feels like we’re on a perilous, narrow mountain path we can fall off at any time.”