Agamemnon
Agamemnon is the first chapter in my translation / adaptation of Aeschylus' Oresteia. Beginning to translate this work, I had no idea what I was getting in to. Aeschylus' Greek is astoundingly complex, and layered in meaning after meaning after meaning. There are core concepts which simply have no equivalent in modern thought, and multiple paths one can take through the play.
Because the play was intended to be presented as part of the entire trilogy staged in a single night, I had to trim significantly and found myself having, in multiple places, to choose only one of Aeschylus' many paths to follow. Still, I hope the end result carries something of the power of Aeschylus' original.
For me, translating the play was a genuinely humble experience, but it allowed me the joy of being able to add my voice to the long conversation, ongoing that forms the center of Western culture. That alone made the agony of translation well worth it.
Lutey and the Mermaid
Lutey and the Mermaid, written in 2006, is based on an old cornish folk tale. Lutey is a wrecker, a man who makes his living scavenging the flotsam and jetsam that washes ashore on the coast. One day, he discovers a mermaid who grants him three wishes. He wishes for the power to break evil spells, the power to cast evil spells, and for these powers to be inherited by his sons through all eternity. Fairy tale consequences, naturally, ensue.
Onto this basic structure I imposed a Buddhist parable. "All life is suffering" may not be the most palatable message for what is ostensibly a children's play, but, there you go. The kids have to learn it sometime.
The script calls for an technically complex production, with moving sets, giant puppets and extensive choreography. For this, among other reasons, I've never attempted to stage it. But rights are available if anyone feels up to the challenge.
What Ho, Jerusalem?
What Ho, Jerusalem?
takes place in a P.G. Woodehouse universe, in an English country mansion with marriages, alcohol and twits taking center stage. Except where in Woodehouse's universe all the racism, anti-semitism and crass materialism has been stripped out, I've lovingly put it all back in.
The structure also follows along the lines of Greek New Comedy, although where those plots usually end on a recognition scene where a long-lost child is identified and it ties everything up neatly, I decided to stick my recognition scene in the second act and have it make things much, much more complicated.
What Ho, Jerusalem? was produced in a staged reading by Ape & Astronaut in 2004.
The Modern Olympia
The Modern Olympia concerns the struggles of Theoéphile LeClerc, a friend and associate of Manet who happened to arrive at the idea for a painting similar to Olympia at he same time as Manet. The coincidence shattered their friendship for years, until Degas forced a reconciliation in 1870. Manet was so impressed by his old companion's work that he arranged for a show, gathering all of LeClerc's work together, where it was tragically destroyed - along with its creator - during the Prussian bombardment of Paris.
Except none of that stuff ever happened.
My idea with The Modern Olympia was to create a portrait of an artist who had been rightly forgotten by history, and through in a few comments on the rabid commercialization of Impressionism which has reduced one of the most radical movements in art history to an excuse for selling notepaper. And I also wanted to write something with a little senseless violence and gratuitous nudity.
What Ho, Jerusaelm takes place more in an idea of history than in history itself. I like to think that if this alternative universe that contained Théophile LeClerc had been allowed to continue along in its existence, it would have developed into the world of 'Allo 'Allo.
The Modern Olympia was produced in a full production by Ape & Astronaut in 2005.
