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Photo – Jeff Busby

The first scene alone is a masterpiece of suspense. There are three men on stage. You, the audience, know that two of them have been sent to kill the third. You don’t know, however, who is who. As they banter and joke and philosophise, sounding like any group of blokes at a party, your suspicions shift from side to side as you try to work out who are the killers and who the man about to die.

It’s the kind of scene more likely to play out in a Tarantino thriller than in a staging of Greek tragedy but in the china shop of theatrical conventions, Belvoir’s production of Thyestes is a raging bull. The set is starkly abstract, a narrow strip of blank white stage that divides the audience so that at all times you are seeing both on-stage action and crowd reaction. All parts, male and female, are played by the three men. Curtains rise and fall between every scene, cutting the action like film edits, while electric subtitles play the role of Greek chorus.

As for the story, it’s Greek tragedy, so you know the score. There will be blood. Thyestes’ tale is mainly that of his brother, Atreus, and if you don’t know him, let’s just say he was bad even by Greek myth’s lurid standards. Several well known tragic heroes – Orestes, Electra, Agamemnon – were cursed by the gods just for being related to him. In bringing his story to life, Belvoir haven’t stinted on shock value. This show will confront you in every way imaginable and then some.

It’s far from being all gloom and portent however. Written by director Simon Stone in collaboration with cast members Mark Winter, Chris Ryan and Thomas Henning, the script is naturalistic and full of verve, frequently with a breezy humour to it that belies the dire themes moving in under-current. While the subtitles advance the murderous plot, the onstage action dances around the main events. Often the focus is on in-between moments, raucous good times just before they’re shattered or quiet moments of aftermath.

This use of humour and pathos is an important factor in the show’s ultimate impact. You relate to the characters on a personal level, rather than identifying them with their misdeeds. Their fates are not distant mythological dooms, they become very real horrors.

Originally produced by Melbourne’s Hayloft Project in 2010 for the Melbourne Fringe Festival, the show draws on the classic dramatisation of the legend of Atreus by Roman writer Seneca. A wider range of sources have also been incorporated, with the lead-up to and repercussions of the events of Seneca’s play presented as a split timeline, working both forwards and backwards through time toward a central dramatic climax of almost unbearable intensity.

With a cunning script, slick stagecraft from the technical crew, a killer soundtrack and three jaw-dropping performances, this production does everything right. This is theatre at its most vital and most affecting. Even the Ancient Greeks would be stunned.


Sydney Festival and Belvoir in association with Carriageworks present
Thyestes
Co-written by Simon Stone, Thomas Henning, Chris Ryan and Mark Winter after Seneca

Directed by Simon Stone

Venue: Carriageworks, Eveleigh
Dates: January 18 – February 19, 2012
Tickets: $62 – $42
Bookings: 1300 723 038

Originally created by THE HAYLOFT PROJECT
A Malthouse commission.