mstakenidentity | Lysistrata- like I'd post about anything else right now!

We got reviewed!

(The first paragraph is a synopsis, so if you know the plot, skip it. Also, since this is my live journal, i've bolded the bits about me)

Review - Lysistrata - Omniprop Productions - Melbourne Fringe

Disparate Housewives

The most ribald of Aristophanes’ plays, if not the most of ribald of all plays, was composed when he was in his thirties but at times resembles something you’d find scribbled in the back of a fourteen-year-old boy’s school notebook. Lysistrata is an Athenian woman who persuades the Athenian wives to vow to withhold sexual favours from their husbands until they abandon a senseless war that has been waging against Sparta for twenty years. The ban is also taken up by the Spartan women and to show that she means business Lysistrata and her followers join with a group of old women who have taken over the Acropolis and together take over the treasury that funds the war. Old men attempt to smoke them out but are defeated by the old women, then a magistrate tries to order them out but is humiliated and repulsed. After a week when the Athenian and Spartan men are in (what the most uncensored translation I had found calls) obvious and extreme sexual excitement” do they concede to Lysistrata’s demands. Lysistrata summons a beautiful woman named Reconciliation who unites the Athenian and Spartan diplomats.

Omniprop is drama society started by the Classics students “to indulge their histrionic ambitions, and actually muck about with some Greek and Roman plays instead of writing obsequious essays on them”. Sure they “muck about” but in a way that is respectful without being reverential to these ancient authors giving them a contemporary directness. The adaptation retains the layout of the original, some characters are rolled into one and the chorus is reduced to a duet but the approach to dramaturgy in refreshingly simple. “I gave it to the actors,” says director Seamus Magee, “told them to make it funny. And then I told them to do it again and make it funnier.” As for the bawdiness, that has defeated most translations of this play “I’ve taken his words and tried to milk them dry for every last drop of laughter,” Magee continues, “at the expense of literal ‘correctness’ and certainly at the expense of any sense of romanticism.” In short he calls “a cock a cock and a fuck a fuck – just as Aristophanes did 2400 years ago.”

The translation makes some funny topical references, the various women come from Melbourne suburbs, Australian politicians are named, the wine glass oath is sworn using a popular local drop; topicalities are mixed anachronistically with terms and names from ancient Greece and the result is as screwball as the plot. The no-holds-barred language is used throughout as though, and correctly, it was the appropriate language and the actors play it as Aristophanes wrote it. Some parts have not worn their 2400 years well but the most well known aspect of the play, the effect of the no-nookies policy is staggeringly dirty! Theatre history is packed with memorable scenes where women arouse men; here Aristophanes creates the original and most literal cock-tease ever written when a woman teases her husband, who is sporting more wood than Sherbrooke forest, into voting for peace. All the scenes involving the sex starved men are ingenious; when the Athenian and Spartan officials negotiate a truce the figure of reconciliation is a blow-up doll. That Lysistrata is an anti-war play, and an anti-pointless war that has been going on far too long play at that, makes a timely parallel with the Gulf Wars too although it is not pushed too hard here. Being student actors and not primarily drama students means that this production may not make the Green Room Awards but everyone involved has a special understanding of Classical Theatre and it comes across but there is a very accomplished performance from Christina Curtin as Lysistrata. Lysistrata is the first female lead in European theatre and Curtain, does it proud, looking a Brigit Jones in thigh boots and business clothes and inspiring every scene and everyone around her. Director Magee also contributes a very funny cameo, in military beret and jungle fatigues (and anything but fatigued wood - if you know what I mean) as the Spartan Ambassador. A boner-fide classic!

Lysistrata or The Revolt of the Women (411 BC) by Aristophanes

Lysistrata - Christina Curtain
Kalonike - Kate Naughton
Myrrhine - Elise Kendall
Lampito - Helen Slaney
Councillor - John Kelly
Kinesias - Sam Browne
Old Man - Will Morris
Old Woman - Sharon Flynn
Spartan Ambassador - Seamus Magee

Director - Seamus Magee
Costumes - Eva Gaita
Music - Michael Pearson
Prosthesist (the person that made the dicks) - Andrea Sinclair
Artistic Mentor - Melanie Beddie
Old Council Chamber, Trades Hall, Carlton
80 minutes (no interval)
Omniprop Productions
POSTED BY MICHAEL MAGNUSSON AT 3:15 PM
LABELS: CLASSIC, MELBOURNE FRINGE FESTIVAL, MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY DRAMA

Whee!!!!!!!

In other news, I'm tired, working two days here, three days there type jobs, it was

mc_shamo's birthday yesterday and we had a wonderful relaxing day, involving much nice food and lying around.

If you haven't come along yet, there are plenty of tickets for tonight! It would be awesome if you booked, but you most probably won't need to tonight (next week- different story) you can go to the fringe office in Fed Square in person, or www.melbournefringe.com.au, or just rock up tonight by 8:20pm.

The pace is killing me, but I fucking love this show!