"War Paint" on Broadway: The Good, The Bad, and The Not Ugly Can't Be Ugly With So Much Makeup Involvedby Randi / November 2, 2017
Woot it’s Theatre Thursday! Today’s review is of the Sondheim classic “Follies”, playing at London’s National Theatre until January 3.
Every musical is supposed to teach you something or share some important life truth with you. At least that’s how I think about them. The lesson of “Follies” is that after you stop being a showgirl, life suuuuuucks and people suuuuuuck and you’ll never be happy again and you’ll just trudge through life counting time units in a deep dark depression. But with sequins! The new production of “Follies” at the National Theatre in London did what few productions of “Follies” are able to do: make me feel something besides boredom. Sure I felt a LOT of that – it’s not my favorite musical – but I also got EMOTIONAL. At SEVERAL points. Okay those of you who know me are probably saying to their screens ‘um you cry at car commercials tho’ and yes that’s true and valid but I don’t mean I cried, I mean like, I felt for these supremely unlikable characters instead of hoping that they all go to the bad place.
Right off the bat, let me share the very worst thing about this production. I saw the 2011 Broadway Revival of Follies (which I’m going to reference a lot because THAT CAST), and I don’t remember getting a kidney infection afterwards, so I’m going to guess that it was two acts with a 15 minute intermission LIKE NORMAL HUMANS DO. I have a great memory (with lists of the names of all who’ve wronged me) (just kidding) (am I?) so if I don’t remember being tortured, I assume an experience was nontorturous and that Broadway gave an intermission (New Yorkers drink their water). But this West End production apparently wants to render Brexit insignificant and stop anyone from wanting to enter the UK ever again because it HAS NO INTERMISSION BUT IT’S OVER TWO HOURS LONG I MEAN I CAN’T HOW YOU CAN POSSIBLY THINK THAT’S A GOOD IDEA.
You think I’m done yelling but my neighbors can tell you that’s simply not true.
So you may have gathered by now that there’s no intermission, despite other productions of the show being two acts, and though they say the run time is 2 hours 15 minutes, it was closer to 2 hours 25 minutes till I got to go to the bathroom again. But even so, two hours without intermission is usually unheard of! The average act is an hour anyway so like stick in an intermission ya jackwagons! If I could punch a show in the face, I would. I guess I could punch whoever’s idea this was (it would not have messed up the narrative at all) but I don’t like violence. Unless whoever’s idea this was also happened to vote for Brexit, then we can talk. with fists.
Okay, let’s get back to the show itself. “Follies” is the beloved tragic musical by Stephen Sondheim and James Goldman from 1971, about a bunch of old people who reunite at the NYC ‘Ziegfeld Follies’-type theatre where they once danced in the skimpiest yet sparkliest costumes with lots and lots of feathers on their heads, to say goodbye before it’s torn down. It’s thus a lot of reminiscing and the interpersonal drama that comes from a lifetime of memories, whether they’re accurately remembered or fabricated by time. Sounds like it’s for the “Best Little Old Foreign Marigold Hotel” crowd or whatever it’s called minus whoever Dev Patel brings in, right? Right. Story: When we were about to leave for the theatre, it was suddenly wintry and I had to pull my winter coat out of storage – where it had been vacuum-packed with BOY coats which means it smelled like boys’ college dorm floors. I know, horrid. I worried that it would smell so bad for whoever I’d be sitting next to, and Husband said “don’t worry they’ll probably smell worse from overdosing perfume [get it we’re making fun of old biddies]; it’s that kind of show, right?” “Actually,” I said, “it might be from the people onstage too.” Get it because it’s not only a show that attracts older audiences, it’s also a show about and starring old ladies and they wear too much perfume. At least the very waspy ones do. We’re mean I know but you know what’s even worse? Wearing perfume.
Unclear why the show art features David Bowie
Now, going in, I knew that I don’t loooove this show, but it’s SONDHEIM. So I do love some of the music and what it achieves dramatically. “Too Many Mornings” is one of my all-times, probably because my mom always played the Mandy Patinkin version in the car when I was little and it was beyond. Actually it’s so good I want you to listen to it here while you read the rest of this (it starts with the song “Pleasant Little Kingdom” which was cut from the original production; “Too Many Mornings” as it’s used in the show now starts at about the 2:00 mark but you know what just listen to the whole thing it’s RG). And with a cast this stellar, I had to see what they did with it. That’s why we bought tickets – Sally in this production is played by Imelda Staunton, my favorite Shakespearean maid from the ‘90s and now all of a sudden Britain’s foremost musical theatre actress. Another London theatre ledge, Janie Dee, stars as the acerbic Phyllis, and another, Tracie Bennett (last seen on Broadway as Judy Garland) would have the supporting but often scene-stealing role of Carlotta, who sings the musical theatre standard “I’m Still Here”. Though there are plenty (too many) of other supporting characters who get their chance to shine (too many shines), it’s mainly about a quartet of people – Sally, frumpy, depressed, and heartsick over a former love; Phyllis, cold and hardened to the world by what her life became; Ben, all-important, famous, unfulfilled and self-hating; and Buddy, the kind of guy who tells really dumb jokes to strangers and then shakes their hand while saying ‘Buddy Plummer, glad to meet ya!’ or some shit like that. Like I said, I saw it on Broadway about six years ago, and that cast was stellar too – Ron Raines, Jan Maxwell, Danny Burstein (my fave), Jayne Houdyshell, Mary Beth Peil, and the biggest draw for most people, Bernadette Peters as Sally. The cast was superb, but despite the parts working well, I didn’t connect with the show as a whole back then. It left me cold, like something important was missing but is present now. Maybe it’s the direction (pretty flawless here), maybe it’s that the grasp of the intent of the material was undeniable, maybe it’s the fact that I had to pee the whole time so I was on high alert, but I connected this time. I still don’t love the show – it has some shitbits (not to be confused with Fitbits, which can also be shit) – but it worked so much better for me here.
But not for the first 20 minutes or so. The opening is still mind-numbingly slow, as all the former Weisman girls arrive and marvel at how the theatre has changed and aged along with them. The National Theatre’s enormous size helps here, because the old theatre set rotates so you’re like ooh ahh and all the gorgeous showgirls of yesteryear prance about in their feathers and jewels. So “Follies” famously has the young versions of its core quartet onstage with their modern-day counterparts, showing what their history encompassed and what their relationships were really like back in the day. It enhances what we know about these connections and makes it all even sadder when you see how happy they once were. The rest of the ensemble comprises the young ghosts for all the other ladies too, but less conspicuously. In fact, I don’t even remember that the other women had ghosts follow them around in past productions, but here they undeniably were, decked out in their former glittery costumes and headdresses and heels while observing what they’ve become. But it was hard to miss here because it works so well. Some of the tiniest moments, not even front and center, that arose from this were the most moving in the show. Like as each lady arrives, her younger-self-ghost (I mean it’s not a ghost it’s a memory…ghost) finds her and shadows her and stuff. The oldest lady sings her old operatic number from the show with the help of her younger self (whose voice is stronger and can hit the high notes still), which was a very nice touch although it was part of the really boring section that gives too much time to unnecessary characters. My favorite ensembleghost moment was right at the beginning when one heard her name realizing that her current self has arrived and she moves up through the crowd to start ghostin on her and sees that she is now dowdy and stout and her face FALLS. You weren’t even supposed to be looking at that actress playing the younger self of this minor character and it was everything, so I hope whoever is in that ensemble track gets a cookie or something. So good.
And then the characters we’ve been waiting for arrive and at an applause break (the only time it’s okay to make short whispers in a theatre) Husband said to me “is that Imelda?!” I thought he just couldn’t figure out which one she was because she’s sporting a superfrump makeover for this role but he later clarified that he didn’t know she was in the show at all. Dude that’s why we bought tickets! Anyway we meet Imelda’s Sally, who is so damaged that she made me super uncomfortable, in an appropriate way. She talks too fast and talks over herself somehow and is clearly not in a good state of mind and you just want to shake her and be like take a breeeeath. She married Buddy, her sweetheart (actually they call the boys who wait for the girls after the show their ‘stage door Jonny’ I am crying) from during her time in the theatre, who became some sort of overly friendly but kind of oily salesman while she raised their kids, kept house as they moved from place to place, and wasted lots of time thinking about her former love from the same time gasp Ben, who at the time was dating Sally’s bff Phyllis and now those two are married. I knowww. So Sally married Buddy but is still in love with Ben, Buddy has a long-time affair with a woman who loves him but he still loves his wife even though he doesn’t want to, Ben has affairs allatime and doesn’t know what he wants or who he loves because he hates himself (‘you cannot share real love until you love yourself’ –Rent), and Phyllis has lost all sense of joy because she hates Ben and hates what they have become and pretty much hates everything except super chic clothes and killer putdowns. Phyllis is the type of person that sharp-edged girls would be like ‘she’s my hero’ but she’s supes broken so like pick a different hero.
The whole first half hour or so is like a less fun version of the “Beautiful Girls” scene from “Singin’ in the Rain” which is the most useless thing ever, so you get that I was eager for it to end. Finally it gave way to some good music and some intrigue, as we learn the intricacies of their relationships, both in the past and present. And then Carlotta (Tracie Bennett) gives the best performance of the big song “I’m Still Here”, in which she shares how despite all the shit she’s endured throughout her long career she still clawed her way through and is, in fact, still here and still doing her thang and until I see something top her in the next few months I’m going to say that Tracie is going to win an Olivier for this. She was FLAAAAMES. I was so there with her. I LOVED how they changed up the usual staging of this number, from the usual plant-and-shout spotlight solo to having her begin seated, lounging, surrounded by seated ensemble members like she was a celebrity sharing stories with a group of adoring fans, and then having the ensemble disappear while she stood up and began to, well, plant and shout but it was amazeballs.
Carlotta’s fierce drive and determination to overcome whatever challenges she has faced in life contrasts with our main characters, who kind of flail about in misery and self-hatred. Especially Sally, who is really an extra sad sack in this one. She has a lot of lines about how she’s going to kill herself and how she’s going to die but for the first time I actually thought she might. Imelda is great as usual and made me feel sadder than ever for Sally – not because she can’t be with the man she loves (or thinks she loves or fondly remembers loving) but because she can’t snap out of it. Her duet of “Too Many Mornings” with Ben was not as enjoyable as I like it to be because her anxiety and discomfort made me uncomfortable, but that’s a valid choice. I didn’t like how she made some of the lines a little more comical than usual (her “I should have worn green” was like played for laughs but it’s sad!) but still she conveyed the necessary lovelorn damage. Ben shocked me, because I’m still not completely in on British theatre, so I didn’t know that the actor, Philip Quast, was kind of a big deal. Guys, he won the Olivier for best actor in a musical three times. How did I not know about him? And not only three times, but for the three BEST male roles in classic musical theatre – George Seurat, Javert, and Emil de Becque. I know. If I were a cop I would be asked to turn in my gun and badge right now. But yeah he was wonderful, in strong booming voice, as all Bens should be, that hides that he’s falling apart inside.
Peter Forbes’s Buddy was very good, but I am partial to Danny Burstein in all ways and I think his Buddy just can’t be beat – it made you feel for him in more complex ways than just ‘oh he’s funny and cheerful but also an ass but we still want him to be happy.” He made Buddy so real and damaged and lovable too, and while I didn’t wish Peter’s Buddy harm, I didn’t really care about him. Husband thought he was great so I think I’m just biased. Janie Dee’s Phyllis was perfection, dropping one liners like Obama drops mics. Even though she didn’t seem to be in good voice (a lot of breaking at times when it wouldn’t be an acting choice), her “Could I Leave You” was, again, flames. It’s a difficult song, as she’s pretty much sarcastically shouting to Ben, making it seem like she couldn’t leave him and their wonderful life but it’s sarcastic and it’s hard to sing sarcasm! But it was incredible.
Even harder to do is Phyllis’s “The Story of Lucy and Jessie”, but that’s because it’s kind of annoying and the lyrics are amateur for Sondheim. It’s a thinly veiled tale of how Phyllis and Sally always wanted what the other had and were jealous of each other but it has lyrics like ‘Lucy is juicy and Jessie is dressy’ erma gerd I feel like he wrote these lyrics on a dare and was like ‘watch they’ll still say it’s all genius!’ This song comes in the “Loveland” section of the show, which is always tricky. In Loveland, each of the four mains are forced to deal with what’s plaguing them in a follies (like vaudeville) performance. Phyllis’s, as above, is usually my least favorite and once you get the general concept of her song, they try to distract you with a big dance number. Janie did a great job dancing her ass off but I still feel blah about it. Buddy’s folly was better, in which he explains in a super cheerful clownish manner how he has “those god-why-don’t-you-love-me-oh-you-do-I’ll-see-you-later blues”. The lyrics in this one are so clever and they present Buddy’s issues clearly, but after the first so-clever verse you’re like okay I get it, he wants what he can’t have and when he gets it he doesn’t want it. Ben’s and Sally’s follies won the show for me, though. Sally sings the famous “Losing My Mind” and Imelda put to bed all those haters who say that she’s not really so much of a singer. Her beautiful, heartbreaking rendition was what made me think to myself okay this is overall a great production. And Ben continued to surprise me with his “Live, Laugh, Love”, which was so perfectly done that his spiral and forgetting of the lyrics seemed real. The first break, I think a lot of the audience just thought he forgot the words and got frustrated (Husband did). That’s incredible! Ugh so good. I hate the whole Loveland conceit in theory but it’s always good once it gets started, especially if the actors follow through like these did.
Will you leave the theatre joyous and uplifted after seeing this production (any production) of “Follies”? Fuck no. It’s pretty much saying ‘you’ll never be as happy as you were in your youth and everything is terrible and then you’re old and you missed your chance.’ So not exactly a feel-good show. But this pretty flawless production will make you consider all the existential troubles of life that any good drama should leave you frantically worrying about. Plus sooo many feathers.
INFO
The Olivier Theatre at the National is a freaking barn so there’s really no bad seat. It’s so big that you can see no matter what. There are toilets in the hallways after your ticket is checked so that’s better than some of the theatres in this complex. There were several signs that any bags bigger than like a sheet of computer paper would have to be checked so I took my coat off and held it over my bag so no one would see and I wouldn’t have to comply with that noise. I like rules and regulations but not when they exist for no good reason.
STAGE DOOR
Didn’t for several reasons – this complex is super confusing and it’s never worth it, and after seeing how mean these old ledges can be to each other I didn’t want them to yell at me for taking up their time ah so scary.
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The Autumn of Dave Malloy Continues with London’s Ghost Quartet
It’s Theatre Thursday! Today’s show is Ghost Quartet, playing at London’s new Boulevard Theatre until January 4.
About 10 seconds into our performance of Ghost Quartet, husbo and I smiled at each other giddily: It sounds like Dave. It is remarkable that a modern composer has so assuredly developed his own unique sound, that you immediately recognize as His (Dave’s not god’s) as soon as you hear it. There are maybe 4 working composers you can say that about. I am grateful for Dave Malloy’s weird and wacky and uncanny sound, what can I say.
As usual with his shows, Ghost Quartet is a challenging assortment of brilliant moments, beautiful music, and lovely abstract storytelling, plus some too-vague storytelling, songs that don’t fit, and moments that should have been cut. Going into a Malloy show, you know that the seeming lack of editing down to its best form is part of the package (common when one individual is writing the music, lyrics, and book (collaboration leads to tighter shows)) but that seems to be a key aspect: he forces you to reckon with what you might consider the fat. He mixes absolute gorgeousness with a lack of clarity, with ridiculous noise, sometimes boring bits, things that go on too long, &c. They sometimes feel like a dare, like he’s daring us to question what he decided to keep in order to understand the project more deeply. And sure I am again questioning what he decided to keep, but I almost kind of love the mixture of high and low, good and not so good.
Ghost Quartet in particular has an exceptionally vague ‘story’ being told through the song cycle sung by the four talented cast members, who announce the side and track number of this ‘album’ before each song. Okay so I just read the synopsis on Wikipedia and said ‘really? what?’ like 18 times. Like I said, the story is so unclear and is actually four interweaving stories told in chaotic order, which helps with the whole mystical tone but I did not get 90% of what the wiki says. It seems generally that there is a woman named Rose, who fell in love, but the guy chose her sister and Rose wanted to get revenge, and then Rose took a picture of her ghost, and then there was a young woman who bought a camera from a witchy lady who also had a sister named Rose who died and was this the camera that Rose used to take the ghost picture?? And then there was a family named Usher in the story (based on the Poe story apparently) and the woman lost her daughter, and then the daughter’s daughter too but I think that daughter was the one who became the starchild? and then the sister was also Rose’s lover in another incarnation and even though it seemed to take place a few 100 years ago someone got pushed on a train platform? When did trains start? ALSO at some point Rose meets The Bear, who wants to help her with her revenge maybe? So The Bear starts Rose (I think) off on a new scavenger hunt of four items to give the Into the Woods “the cow as white as milk, the cape as red as blood, the hair as yellow as corn, the slipper as pure as gold” list a run for its money: the bear requests 1) one pot of honey (naturally), 2) one piece of stardust (not suuure how to acquire that but okay) 3) one secret baptism (wat), and 4) a photo of a ghost (oh). It’s just the eensiest bit harder that Sondheim’s but you gotta hand it to the bear, that’s some f-ing list. (I remembered this because I loved its ridiculousness.) I actually cracked up at ‘one secret baptism’; I just wanted to shout ‘FUCK THAT IS SO DAVE. SO. DAVE.’
Oh and also there’s like a scene with Thelonius Monk, or maybe his ghost. Fork me I have no idea what was happening, but it doesn’t really matter what the details are, just that you feel the essence of it through the music, often haunting, sometimes fun, almost always interesting. And the cast of four definitely conveyed the desired eccentric, eerie, provoking essence beautifully. The two women, Carly Bawden and Maimuna Memon, carry the show with their incredible vocal talents and versatility, while the two men, Niccolo Curradi and Zubin Varla (the latter of whom is almost ready to join our list of Jenna Russell, Imelda Staunton, and Michael Ball for Actors Who Seem to be Cast in Everything (except he has actually been well cast whenever we’ve seen him)) provide strong support. All four have moments of brilliance and even hilarity, all while playing numerous instruments and ever-changing characters. They also hand out shaker eggs and serve several types of whiskey to most of the audience (though not to us; I don’t even drink and I was upset at not getting anything) and ask people to join them for the finale, which was cute but distracted from the power of it. The astonishingly gorgeous and moving a cappella quartet that I believe ends Side 3 should have been the finale.
So, whatever’s going on in this story is super confusing but that’s kind of the point; you shouldn’t have full clarity when talking about ghosts. It helped achieve the right vibe to be so nebulous, since the focus is and should be on what the music makes you feel. And they definitely succeed on that front.
INFORMATION
A pre-show informational email said the show was about 90 minutes with no interval but it was 100 minutes. Given that there were 4 ‘sides’ of the ‘album’ and not 2, this show really would have benefited from an interval. I realize it’s still short for an interval but it would really work here. Also it felt much longer, which is a disservice to the show. (ALSO – it should just be 3 sides. The audience expects there to be 2 sides, so much so that when they announced “Side 3, Track 1” there was a bit of a giggle. It totally flows with the whole Ghosty Weirdness to have 3 sides because that’s a little odd. The 4th side was so short anyway and like, too conventional since it completes the set. Don’t complete the set! Let it be weird!)
Sit in the front row if you want to be involved/get whiskey. Sit in our seats (B13 and B14) if you don’t want ANYTHING AT ALL. I’m not mad. (But I was hundo p that I had booked aisle seats, so I was shocked SHOCKED to find that our seats were smack dab in the center of a long row. Luckily, the ‘stalls’ in the round is only 3 rows, and there’s a big gap between B and C so I hopped over at the end to beat the rush to the bathroom because the toilets are FAR (downstairs and on the far side of the restaurant, which blows).
Aside from the toilet sitch, this new theatre is super lovely. I can’t wait to see more shows use this space in interesting ways. (Apparently the balcony section spins. INTO IT.)
“Electra” at the Old Vic Will Do Some Serious Messing With Your Head
Crazy Eyes Ghostface Killah
Through Dec. 20. If in London, you must see this. It’s f-ing nuts but Scott Thomas is a must-see.
When it comes to Greek tragedies, I always assume the main character is going to die at the end. But while some important people do indeed die, spoiler, Electra lives, and nothing unexpected happens at all. So this was almost like a feel-good Greek tragedy!
When it comes to Greek tragedies, I always assume the main character is going to die at the end. But while some important people do indeed die, spoiler, Electra lives, and nothing unexpected happens at all. So this was almost like a feel-good Greek tragedy!
Okay that’s not entirely true. “Electra”, the Sophocles version, not the Euripides, though I imagine they are pretty much identical because TRUE HISTORY, is currently playing at the Old Vic in London and starring the fabulous miraculous sort-of-French wonder Kristin Scott Thomas. “Electra” is a f-ing madhouse of a depressing story, and here, played by an unrecognizable, balls-to-the-wall crazy and fully committed KST, it will tear you apart emotionally and leave you not knowing how to think or feel about anything. (Or just this.) But it’s actually predictable and almost tame compared to other ancient works of its ilk, especially because everything Electra prays for and sets out to do actually happens.
In that regard, the show is kind of boring. Who wants straightforward Greek tragedies! I expected more plot twists. More shocking murderings. It’s actually the background story that’s dramatic, not anything we learn during the 100 minutes of drama. So, if you are familiar with this play, seeing it presents you with more of an emotional roller coaster just in the character of Electra.
Are you familiar with the story? It is indeed nuts. We begin our scene in ancient Mycenae, which the characters here pronounce “my-see-nee” and I have always said “my-sen-eye” so already up is down and black is white. Agamemnon, the king of Mycenae and/or Argos, both of which are said at times and ancient scholars think could have been the same region, but British people don’t care because they hear ‘Argos’ and titter amongst themselves thinking about their beloved discount home goods shoppe, anyway, Agamemnon was killed by his wife Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus. I KNOW. This was actually years ago, and now Clytty and ThroatPhlegm are inhabiting Aggy’s home as King and Queen of Mycergos, with some of their children. Electra long refuses to act as a member of Aegisthus’s household, so she looks and acts more like a servant. Their son and Electra’s stars, moon, sky, and whole universe Orestes was exiled, from fear of his revenging his father, and has been missing for years. Electra has spent these years pretty much squatting in the dirt outside and praying for Orestes’s return.
In that regard, the show is kind of boring. Who wants straightforward Greek tragedies! I expected more plot twists. More shocking murderings. It’s actually the background story that’s dramatic, not anything we learn during the 100 minutes of drama. So, if you are familiar with this play, seeing it presents you with more of an emotional roller coaster just in the character of Electra.
Are you familiar with the story? It is indeed nuts. We begin our scene in ancient Mycenae, which the characters here pronounce “my-see-nee” and I have always said “my-sen-eye” so already up is down and black is white. Agamemnon, the king of Mycenae and/or Argos, both of which are said at times and ancient scholars think could have been the same region, but British people don’t care because they hear ‘Argos’ and titter amongst themselves thinking about their beloved discount home goods shoppe, anyway, Agamemnon was killed by his wife Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus. I KNOW. This was actually years ago, and now Clytty and ThroatPhlegm are inhabiting Aggy’s home as King and Queen of Mycergos, with some of their children. Electra long refuses to act as a member of Aegisthus’s household, so she looks and acts more like a servant. Their son and Electra’s stars, moon, sky, and whole universe Orestes was exiled, from fear of his revenging his father, and has been missing for years. Electra has spent these years pretty much squatting in the dirt outside and praying for Orestes’s return.
Power squatting
KST’s inhabiting of Electra occurs not only in her youthful crazy dancing around, dragging her toes along the sand, but also in her squatting. It’s more of an African tribal dancer squat than a weight lifter squat, and on its own it is pretty compelling. She looks like a bug. And a child. It all just works somehow.
If you didn’t know the story before, you start out definitely on Electra’s side. You want her to get her shit together, sure; the physical manifestation of her deteriorating mental stability is pitiful (and astounding). When you learn why she hates her mother so much, you’re like, yeah, okay, I see your point. What do you do if the one parent you have left murdered the other one? That’s pretty much as dark as you can get, psychologically.
But then we meet Clytemnestra herself, who is like a not-as-cool Regina from “Once Upon A Time” (mostly the cleavage), and we learn more of the back story. Ready for the Greek Tragedy Quotient ® to go up a few thousand notches? Clytemnestra killed Agamemnon because Agamemnon killed their daughter. He sacrificed her to win the war or some total b.s. like that, and Clytemnestra believes he did it for his brother Menelaus’s sake, because Menny didn’t have enough children to spare, and Aggy was like “yo bruh I have at least 3 daughters, I can spare at least 1.” Girls be worthless! So now you’re thinking, hold the phone there, Electra – your dad killed your sister, to appease the gods of war and some such b.s., and you didn’t really care? Umm that’s not exactly the sign of a fully functioning mental state. Once we know this much, we feel a little more sympathy for Clytemnestra. Sure, more violence is never the answer to violence, as this cycle usually begets more violence AND causes you to say violence four times in one sentence, but dayum, at least now you kind of get why she wanted to kill her husband. As far as reasons go, it’s a pretty good one.
Of course, the whole cold-hearted first-degree-murdery plotting of the killing argues against her heat-of-passion defense, plus there was the whole adultery aspect and making her lover the new king. So she’s not completely excused by revenge. But it’s not as clear-cut as we once thought. It’s not as simple as Electra wants us to believe.
Okay, so now we know more, the audience is grappling with heavy moral questions, awful people and awful things abound, demanding our attention and demanding to know where our sympathies lie. Clytemnestra’s story pulls at certain sympathies at first, but then she acts like a total crazy power-hungry warlord. Her ‘World of Warcraft’ style gold-plated dress doesn’t help. She’s not all sunshine. Then we have Electra, who has completely lost her shit, who is dancing and power-squatting all over the sandy stage, and is devoted without hesitation to her hatred of her mother and Aegisthus. But the all-encompassing hatred seems oddly fresh, so many years after the tragedy, and we realize it’s out of necessity. Electra needs to hold fast to this hatred to give reason and purpose to her wasted life and wasted mind. She has to commit to the intensity of her mad hatred, or else any doubt that seeps in could make her realize that it was all in vain, her resolute refusal to act as a member of Aegisthus’s house, to care for her own health at all, to live any kind of life. If she let second thoughts in, the strangely strong structure of hatred and revenge would crumble and leave her even more debilitated. This characterization reminded me of “West Side Story”, when Anita tells Maria that Tony killed her brother. Maria can only say (sing) “I have a love and it’s all that I have, Right or wrong what else can I do”, because it was all she had, and if she let the fact that her love killed her brother enter her head, she’d lose her f-ing mind. She, like Electra, makes a survivalist decision to focus on a sort of half-truth rather than let the whole picture screw with their version of reality.
And Kristin Scott Thomas portrays all of this, somehow, almost even without her words. Her physicality alone tells you everything you need to know, how her experiences have rendered her nearly inoperable. You so feel for her that, when her brother Orestes actually returns home to enact the revenge they’ve all been waiting and praying for, you actually wish them well for a moment. Yay Electra and Orestes! Hug it out! Get well! Do your thang! Then you realize that their thang is double homicide and you close one eye as all the bloodshed happens. And then it ends. No seriously, they kill the king and queen and say “Yay revenge! High five!” and then it ends. Good show!
If you didn’t know the story before, you start out definitely on Electra’s side. You want her to get her shit together, sure; the physical manifestation of her deteriorating mental stability is pitiful (and astounding). When you learn why she hates her mother so much, you’re like, yeah, okay, I see your point. What do you do if the one parent you have left murdered the other one? That’s pretty much as dark as you can get, psychologically.
But then we meet Clytemnestra herself, who is like a not-as-cool Regina from “Once Upon A Time” (mostly the cleavage), and we learn more of the back story. Ready for the Greek Tragedy Quotient ® to go up a few thousand notches? Clytemnestra killed Agamemnon because Agamemnon killed their daughter. He sacrificed her to win the war or some total b.s. like that, and Clytemnestra believes he did it for his brother Menelaus’s sake, because Menny didn’t have enough children to spare, and Aggy was like “yo bruh I have at least 3 daughters, I can spare at least 1.” Girls be worthless! So now you’re thinking, hold the phone there, Electra – your dad killed your sister, to appease the gods of war and some such b.s., and you didn’t really care? Umm that’s not exactly the sign of a fully functioning mental state. Once we know this much, we feel a little more sympathy for Clytemnestra. Sure, more violence is never the answer to violence, as this cycle usually begets more violence AND causes you to say violence four times in one sentence, but dayum, at least now you kind of get why she wanted to kill her husband. As far as reasons go, it’s a pretty good one.
Of course, the whole cold-hearted first-degree-murdery plotting of the killing argues against her heat-of-passion defense, plus there was the whole adultery aspect and making her lover the new king. So she’s not completely excused by revenge. But it’s not as clear-cut as we once thought. It’s not as simple as Electra wants us to believe.
Okay, so now we know more, the audience is grappling with heavy moral questions, awful people and awful things abound, demanding our attention and demanding to know where our sympathies lie. Clytemnestra’s story pulls at certain sympathies at first, but then she acts like a total crazy power-hungry warlord. Her ‘World of Warcraft’ style gold-plated dress doesn’t help. She’s not all sunshine. Then we have Electra, who has completely lost her shit, who is dancing and power-squatting all over the sandy stage, and is devoted without hesitation to her hatred of her mother and Aegisthus. But the all-encompassing hatred seems oddly fresh, so many years after the tragedy, and we realize it’s out of necessity. Electra needs to hold fast to this hatred to give reason and purpose to her wasted life and wasted mind. She has to commit to the intensity of her mad hatred, or else any doubt that seeps in could make her realize that it was all in vain, her resolute refusal to act as a member of Aegisthus’s house, to care for her own health at all, to live any kind of life. If she let second thoughts in, the strangely strong structure of hatred and revenge would crumble and leave her even more debilitated. This characterization reminded me of “West Side Story”, when Anita tells Maria that Tony killed her brother. Maria can only say (sing) “I have a love and it’s all that I have, Right or wrong what else can I do”, because it was all she had, and if she let the fact that her love killed her brother enter her head, she’d lose her f-ing mind. She, like Electra, makes a survivalist decision to focus on a sort of half-truth rather than let the whole picture screw with their version of reality.
And Kristin Scott Thomas portrays all of this, somehow, almost even without her words. Her physicality alone tells you everything you need to know, how her experiences have rendered her nearly inoperable. You so feel for her that, when her brother Orestes actually returns home to enact the revenge they’ve all been waiting and praying for, you actually wish them well for a moment. Yay Electra and Orestes! Hug it out! Get well! Do your thang! Then you realize that their thang is double homicide and you close one eye as all the bloodshed happens. And then it ends. No seriously, they kill the king and queen and say “Yay revenge! High five!” and then it ends. Good show!
