Following hard on the heels of Robert Icke’s reworking of Sophocles’ tragedy which only recently closed at Wyndham’s comes this adaptation by Ella Hickson. Icke presented a very contemporary picture with Oedipus a Western-style politician who is seeking election, surrounded by a political family. Hickson keeps him a king, and, though in modern dress and there is a reference to Oedipus being an elected ruler, this is a very different version in a production co-directed by the Old Vic’s Artistic Director Matthew Warchus and Israeli choreographer Hofesh Shechter that makes a stark contrast.
Sophocles’ play takes place entirely in public, but Hickson provides private scenes between members of the ruling family: Oedipus, his wife Jocasta and her brother Creon. Jocasta rejects the oracles and old gods that her soutane-suited brother still claims belief in (and that he sees as a means of controlling the Theban populace), while Oedipus is more of a pragmatist. The people form Sophocles’ chorus, but here, all their text has been cut, replaced by Shechter’s vibrant choreography and the insistent score that he also contributes.
His music is already there pre-show, an ominous grumbling growl below the din of audience chatter, and when the curtain rises on darkness, its booms and bangs are joined by the voice of the wind as we catch a glimpse of first a solitary figure and then a succession of images of turbulent choric ritual interrupted by blackouts. Stamping rhythms, flung out arms, bowed heads and twisting bodies are dramatic and exciting and continue to punctuate the action. They are an ongoing reminder of the people whom the protagonists must please, but they can’t articulate argument.
The Thebans are facing an environmental crisis. In Sophocles, it is a plague; here, drought has brought famine. Oedipus proposes an exodus by the whole city in search of a new home, watered and fertile. Creon seeks salvation in religion. While the people dance for rain, there is already a report of a woman offering her son as a sacrifice, and an oracle is sent for. The ancient sage Tiresias declares the city must find the killer of previous ruler Laius to cleanse it from pollution and points a finger at Oedipus.
As witnesses from the past reveal the fateful facts, Hickson closely follows Sophocles, but it is not quite the same ending.
As Oedipus, Hollywood star and Oscar-winner Rami Malek makes his UK debut, returning to the stage after a long absence. His US accent and the Americanisms Hickson gives him mark him out as different from the Thebans. This is a man who has been lucky ever since he solved the Sphinx’s riddle twenty years earlier, and he expects that to continue, but it is an unfounded confidence that crumbles. You don’t get much sense of the respected ruler.
Creon claims to be supportive, but Nicholas Khan gives an edge to his doctrinaire attitudes that seems antagonistic.
The introduction of domestic moments allows Indira Varma to be seen in relation to her daughters, to suggest an older woman who has guided her husband. She sensibly rejects superstition and touches us with her memory of the baby she had as a teenager. She handles the truth when it comes out in her own way.
The Oracle’s message comes on a crackly reel-to-reel recorder, but there is a fine performance from Cecelia Noble as prophet Tiresias. When called on to make her pronouncement, she holds the whole house in her hand for a long silence. The messenger who brings news from Corinth and the Shepherd who took charge of baby Oedipus are an integral part of the story and positively played by Joseph Mydell and Nicholas Woodeson, though their roles seem a little truncated.
Shechter’s dance episodes are far from truncated. Stimulating though they are, and performed by remarkable dancers, they do go on a lot. Where did these starving Thebans find so much energy? Hunger and thirst has made them frantic. Choreography and music are hugely effective with stunning effect when the rains do come, but instead of giving support and complement the rest of the action, they risk overpowering it. Tom Visser’s lighting fortunately helps to counter that. Dramatically used to relocate where we see the dance ritual, it helps create a continuity of revelation and dazzlingly gives us the scorching sun that has dried up the Theban land.
There will be many more versions of Sophocles: the play and the Oedipus legend. This one lacks poetry but offers striking theatricality. Its ending made me wonder how Ella Hickson would continue her version of this ancient story.