ANTIGONE
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The much longer and unendurable production that followed borrows from both Sophocles’ and Anouilh’s versions of Antigone. To these mismatched sources McCullough has added some original material, recasting the chorus as foreign correspondents and press agents, and setting the action in a third-world country. In spite of the production, using members of the media as the chorus was a brilliant idea, both preserving and cleverly updating the classical function of the chorus as interlocutor, mood setter, and social context. The problem is that the original material written for the chorus is the pits. And once it’s mixed in with Sophocles and Anouilh, you’ve got your definitive classic-in-a-blender production.
The press first appear at a local watering hole, exchanging gratuitous banter. But they don’t look like reporters. They look like avocational actors pretending to be reporters. This impression refuses to subside, and the banter turns to exposition as the new kid on the beat gets filled in on all the local political dope. If you know the plot and premise of Antigone, you may be tempted to daydream through this scene, but stay alert if you don’t want to miss the one decent performance of the evening: Marguerite Hammersley as the waitress. Once the background for the drama is established, the scene concludes with an inexplicable appearance by Antigone that incites a frenzy of flash photography, capturing her in a rapid sequence of Georges Marciano ad poses.
Finally this scene ends, after exhausting half of the show’s playing time. But with no intermission and a whole lot of denouement to come, there’s no relief. You still have to sit through some artsy tableaux, three suicides, a few more media scenes. Tiresias makes two appearances, and (as played by Robert Torchia) he’s not only blind but has an idiosyncrasy of speech that allows him to prophesy things that sound like “Fate works more for falafel fluffy dogs . . .”
