TRAGIC MAGIC, AT 2 RIVER T
Mythbusters: Jay Sullivan catches the red-eye as the besieged title character, condemned by both gods and men, in director Aaron Posner’s ORESTES: A TRAGIC ROMP, now playing at Two River Theater. (Photos by T. Charles Erickson)
There’s Orestes, looking ratty but still Redford-esque — a condemned man who wishes only for a “fair and balanced” trial.
There’s his spinster sister Electra — also counting down a messy fate by stoning (all this for killing their mother Clytemnestra); a woman who tells Orestes that his rich uncle “doesn’t have the balls” to help them.
There’s the legendary beauty Helen of Troy, of whom someone says, “that woman is a radioactive packet.” Oh, and Helen is played by a man.
And, by the time Uncle Menelaus shows up — decked out to resemble nothing short of Hunter S. Thompson — we’ve probably reckoned that we’re not in the classical Greece of the ancient dramatist Euripides (except for that part about men playing women).
Still, we kind of are. It’s just that what 21st century American playwright Anne Washburn and dynamic director Aaron Posner have done with this somewhat dusty tragedy is to sharpen the sword of its attacks on royalty, religion and the ever-imperfect rule of law — effectively bringing this circa-408 B.C. relic up to date without any “Hamlet in Space” shenanigans or already-tired topical references.
In Orestes: A Tragic Romp, the adaptation that opened this past weekend and continues through April 11 at Two River Theater, we’re in the court of the assassinated ruler Agamemnon, a sparsely furnished place of washed-out colors and muted hopes (Daniel Conway’s stylized set is essentially a stone slab, one formidable door and a pair of gravel litterboxes at opposite ends), where Orestes and Electra sweat out 100 intermission-free minutes in an effort to avert their judgment, both divine and democratic.
And when that judgment comes down from on high, it arrives in the disembodied person of an Oscar/ Tony/ Golden Globe nominee from a royal bloodline of a different sort. More on that in a moment.
The cast of ORESTES — minus the unseen Lynn Redgrave — assembles on the stage of Two River Theater, where the TRAGIC ROMP continues its limited run for the next two weeks.
If you’ve forgotten what you learned about Greek mythology back in school — or if you’re under the impression that the concept of the “sequel” came in with the talking pictures — you should know that old Euripides crafted this take on the already well-worn Orestes myth as a continuation of the tale of the cursed house of Tantaius; a sordid saga that picks up from his earlier Electra. The producers have come up with a pretty clever method to bring us all up to speed on the story — a comic book style synopsis by artist Matt Larson, which exists as printed handouts and as oversized blowups on display in the lobby. 300 couldn’t have done it better.
Like Posner’s smash staging of A Midsummer Night’s Dream from earlier this season, Orestes is a co-production with another professional venue — the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, where the production premiered back in January. The entire cast from that acclaimed (if abbreviated by multiple snow days) engagement makes the trip to Red Bank, along with a frequent Posner collaborator — Obie winning composer, sound designer and occasional actor James Sugg, whose work was previously heard in such Two River shows as A Murder, A Mystery and a Marriage, and Melissa Arctic, and whose original odes (performed here by a Greek chorus of “Argive Maidens”) work beautifully with the often verbose text, moving this sometimes challenging play from “tragic” to “romp” and back again.
Made up in the title role to look like a couple of pecan pies caught in a tractor tire, Jay Sullivan still exhibits leading-man looks and a star-quality command that accelerates as the play progresses, while Holly Twyford as Electra sets the pace in the earlier stages of the proceedings (an interlude in which Orestes is largely comatose). Already earning her keep in the difficult female lead, Twyford also does duty as elderly grandfather Tyndareus — with Sullivan also doubling up as a messenger of bad news.
As for Helen of Troy, she’s played here by the many-faceted Chris Genebach, who’s also onstage for most of the play as the rich but ineffectual Menelaus, fiery Orestes buddy Pylades and a cagey Trojan slave bent on self-preservation. The chorus of five women (Lauren Culpepper, Rebecca Hart, Marissa Molnar, Rachel Zampelli and Margo Seibert, doubling as Helen’s daughter) perform Sugg’s siren songs in a way that ranges from churchy reverence to avant garde edginess — and makes a big splash with the audience.
Are we forgetting anyone? Oh yes, there’s Lynn Redgrave — that selfsame scion of the showbiz Redgraves — performing a (pre-recorded) vocal cameo as the great god Apollo. As in the original script by Euripides, the exalted deity makes a classic “deus ex machina” appearance at the play’s end, to more or less wrap things up, put things right, point the townsfolk toward the exits. Unlike Euripides (who probably had to employ this already-creaky dramatic device just to keep his own head on his shoulders), Washburn and Posner have an enormous amount of irreverent fun with the climax; mocking the pomp and circumstance even while exalting our infallible overlords to the highest.
As we detailed here in oRBit last month, what makes this romp especially tragic is the fact that it represents what could very well be the last huzzah for Posner at Two River — the nationally celebrated writer-director-producer will be departing as TRTC’s Artistic Director in June — although he’ll have a hand in the selection of the 2010-2011 season, the official announcement of which will be made at a public reception on April 6. We wish all godspeed (and theatrical projects free of curses) for the man who famously brought the blood-drenched Scottish Play to the crimson banks of the Navesink.
Tickets for Orestes: A Tragic Romp are $35 - $61 and are available by calling the TRTC Box Office at (732)345-1400, or visit the TRTC website for ticket prices and availability — as well as info on Before-Play discussions, post-show talkbacks, and other special-event performances.
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March 29, 2010
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