02/01/2018
Rhys M. Becks
In Review of :
“Oedipus The King”
Director Unknown
A.D.C. Theatre Company brought to us “Oedipus The King”, written originally by Sophocles in about 430 B.C. .
“Oedipus The King”, was staged at the Corpus Playroom. A theatre rather unusual in shape. It was one short rectangle of a room with raked benches as seating, met by another room of the same sort, at a right angle. It was was in the small corner where the two seating areas met that the ancient Greek Tragedy was staged. The atmosphere of the auditorium was slightly dull in feel, but with a slight hint of welcome and acceptance. However the production left something to be desired.
The A.D.C. Theatre Company decided to use the Robert Fagles translation. One which in some places, according to another audience member, was “crass, and unfitting.” I went expecting to see a Greek Chorus, with physical theatre perhaps some Suzuki elements and was rather disappointed when I realised the players were just going to perform the chorus as a piece of realism. This made everything rather drawn out and at times rather tedious to endure. I legitimately heard snoring in the row in front of me, and the lady next to me did nod off once or twice.
But in saying all this I commend the actors and actresses for managing to hold everything together, and still hold the audiences attention and suspense. Although performed in a style not quite befitting the play, the cast were paramount in carrying the show, and I could truly see all the work that they had put in. The cast list was not disclosed which makes my individual cast analysis rather difficult. So rather than analysing them each in depth, I shall just give a few general remarks. Firstly they all did very well, very few slippages in lines. The only things that I need remark on would be intonation and body language. The only minor faults in their acting. Sometimes the intonation used was slightly unrealistic and fell a little bit more into the style of classical theatre. This was only very slight. Body language, I just noticed a few players were really carrying a lot of tension in their shoulders, with no contextual reasoning. This made them look uncomfortable, as if they were not meant to, or didn’t want to be there.
The roles and relationships that played out on stage were believable and somewhat realistic, but sort of lacked that little bit of substance. Luckily the audience had been engrossed enough in the story to believe them and to be absorbed into the world of Oedipus.
As far as lighting and sound goes everything was extremely minimal, which is absolutely fine. But for a play of this length. Personally as a director I feel that just a little bit of mood lighting, and perhaps a little bit of music, would of given the whole production a bit of a lift. The set and overall staging was plain, simple and effective enough.
In closing, although substandard and lacking in parts, the overall experience was pleasant and most importantly they delivered the story of “Oedipus The King”, successfully.
