The Factory Theater, 791 Tremont St. Boston
May 18th to June 2nd, 2012
Director Ben Evett
Light Design PJ Strachman
Set Design Natalie Laney
Sound Design Chris Larson
Contact Jen O’Connor:
508-944-2939
Admission $20.00
Students $10.00
Review by Dennis Daly
Scurrying along the base of the looming, chemically-stained building,
through the parking lot, under the steam pipe, down the twisted steps and into
a forbidding white-washed brick, claustrophobia-inducing passageway, the door
wedged open with a boulder, I arrived at the Factory Theater. And then it got better, much better.
On opening night the Trojan Women played to a packed
theater. The experience was unforgettable. The light, set, sound, and costume
designers worked magic. You could hear the creaking of Greek ships and almost
smell the tide as it rolled in. Audience members sat among the cast on the gritty
stage as the play began and crazed, damaged women in torn dresses roamed among
them, obviously in shock.
The intimate seating arrangement I liked very much; it
produces an edgy magic. One moment Helen of Troy seduces you with her eye
contact, the next moment a Greek chorus addresses you with a heart-rending
dirge. We were all amazed when, in the distance, Troy burned, and we all
watched that awful spectacle together in the same confined camp-space.
The acting ensemble consists of eight players and two of
them have multiple roles. The three women that make up the chorus mingle
silently with the audience when they are not reciting a choral piece. Their
facial expressions and their graceful movements would put many professional
mimes to shame. They are that good.
Nathaniel Grundy storms onto the stage as an angry but
resigned Poseidon. He wants revenge for the destruction of his especial city
and will eventually get it, albeit, after the action of the play. As Menelaus
he convinces both with his gratuitous cruelty and with his weak-kneed surrender
to Helen’s charms. But it is in the role
of Talthybius, the herald, which he really shines. His occasional humanity as
he delivers his messages in the midst of horror surprises and reassures us that
some vestige of goodness still survives this scenario of total devastation.
Aimee Rose Ranger rules the stage in all four of her roles.
She is clearly doing what she is meant to do. As Athena she is spiteful and
conniving. As Cassandra knowledge leads her to insanity. As Andromache she
brings us to tears with a mother’s pathos. And, as Helen, Ranger truly soars,
exuding sex and guile throughout her amazing performance.
Rosalind Thomas Clark convinces as Hecuba, the fallen queen
of Troy. Her strength in facing the apocalyptic terrors is moving and
understandable to modern sensibilities. The dark stories of Cormac McCarthy
comes to mind.
But the glue that keeps this all together and makes it work
is the writing of the translator Francis Blessington. His lyrical tone builds
an airy and transparent atmosphere about
the action that seems to keep everything in motion, even when the subject is
havoc and slaughter. Listen,
What’s not for me to cry about?
My country, children, husband all have perished.
The grandness of my ancestors
Cut short: how are you nothing now.
Why be silent? Why not?
Why lament?
Miserable I am, under a heavy fate
That lies upon my limbs—what torture!
My back stretched on a hard bed.
My head! My temples!
My ribs! I wish to pitch
And roll my back and spine
On both sides, always
Weeping elegies in song.
And even this is music to the wretched:
To sing their ruin without a dance.
I notice that on occasion a contemporary phrase sneaks into
the poetic speeches and this technique works quite well. When Helen is
defending herself before her Greek husband, Menalaus, she recounts her side of
the story and argues that she was a pawn in a game played by the gods and was in
fact abandoned before she was abducted from her home in Greece. She seems to take a momentary break and then
says,
Now
Not you, but I, shall question myself:
What was I thinking…
That’s pretty funny considering the awful context of this
defensive speech.
Euripides’ Hecuba, as portrayed in Blessington’s often
riveting poetry, is an existential character. She believes life is preferable
to the alternative—even in a concentration camp. She prays to the gods but she
is not too sure that they are there. At one point she prays,
O support of earth, having your seat on earth—
Air or Zeus—whoever you are, difficult to know,
Either necessity of nature or mind of man..
See this extraordinary play. You’ll not regret it.
this review makes me want to see the play.
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