Iliad at NYTW

[skynyc]

If you ever want to go back in history and try to experience what it was like to be in the presence of one of the great traveling storytellers/bards, a la Taliesin, now's your chance. Denis O'Hare and Stephen Spinella are alternating performances to give an oral rendition of the Iliad, (or should I say, the first half of the Iliad.)

 

Created by O'Hare and Lisa Peterson, this is a tour de force of an evening. (I saw O'Hare.) From exacting movement around an almost completely bare stage to the richness of the language, the four of us were riveted from the actor's first appearance, shabbily dressed in an old coat and seated on a suitcase.

 

Modernized only through use of sound tricks and very effectively using a bass (visible, but on a scaffold above the stage and to the left), this was 100 minutes of being totally engaged by a consummate interpreter of story. With brief passages in Greek, O'Hare shouted and whispered, cajoled and caressed us and enthralled us with the tale of Paris, Hector, and Achilles.

 

This is for the well-versed audience member, as there's nothing to watch but one man, but he provides a splendid view.

[+ Lucky]

"the four of us were riveted"

 

There were only four in the audience?