|
|
 |
|
Author
Euripides
Company
Kneehigh
Theatre
Director
Emma Rice
Performer
Mike Shepherd
Craig Johnson
Giles King
Eva Magyar
Robi Lucskai
Daniel Canham
Andrew Brodie
Sarah Moody
Leonie Dodd
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Lyric Theartre
Hammersmith
2nd - 20th November 2004 |
|
A song
by one of the two 'writers'
of this production of the
Bacchae
begins: 'As long as it harms
no other/ Let each man dance
his own dance' - which epitomizes
the way Euripides' extraordinary
tragedy is diluted. It is
not just that songs, and an
extra character, have been
added, and much of the original
has been cut, as if 'writers'
are necessary to rewrite what
Euripides has already done
such a good job of himself.
More importantly, these writers
and the production tame, trivialise
and distort the play's ambivalence.
Euripides is both applauding
and condemning Dionysian revelry,
and to give the impression
that he exhorts us to be considerate,
non-harming Bacchanalians
is only to castrate the power
of his tragedy. 'As long as
it harms no other' is totally
inapposite, and in fact where
this production succeeds,
and where the acting is best
(Eva Magyar's Agave), is where
it shows that the Dionysian
is destructive as well as
liberating.
There is a lot that is powerful
in Kneehigh Theatre's Bacchae
- a long lean Dionysus in
woman's high-heeled golden
shoes and red chimney-pot
hat leaping and undulating
with cricket-bent legs, combining
many styles of dancing in
a universal hotchpotch of
sinuousness; a Tiresias who,
during sudden disquieting
glimpses of the future, distraughtly
wiggles his glasses in front
of his eyes before settling
them back on his nose; a scene
of dissipation on the mountain-side
reminiscent of so many we
have all experienced, accordion
and guitar desultorily sounding
as figures weave around, men
and women tumble in varied
permutations, cocaine is snorted,
drums beaten, bodies collapse.
But it is odd that the 21st
century updating of this immemorial
clash of unfettered wildness
with measured propriety should
be so camp. To signify the
unbridling of the Bacchantes,
a group of bare-chested men
don frilly ballerina skirts
that descend from the gods.
Why should the wild women
be putting on frilliness rather
than throwing it off, and
why should they in fact be
men rather than women? There
is something urban, commercial
and fetishistic about the
sexuality of the production
altogether, which is obviously
supposed to reinvest the play
with meaning but seems to
daub it with a puzzling transsexual
flippancy that jars with its
earthy archetypal timelessness.
This attempt to lure the punters
is anyway misdirected - the
young man in the row behind
me who said, 'Yeah it began
wicked, but it's boring',
seemed appositely to sum up
the audience's apposite response.
Tautly directed, and acted
with energy and conviction,
the Kneehigh Bacchae
has spots of brilliance but
overall lacks illumination.
Jane
O'Grady |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
