Synopsis
‘The Trojan Women’ is a tragedy centering on the horror of war and its aftermath. Euripides based the play on the myths and legends of the Trojan War. Ancient storytellers mythologised the events before, during and after the war. Gods and goddesses took sides and the deeds of Greek and Trojan warriors were also exaggerated, or even fabricated.
The action takes place before the walls of Troy and it’s in ruins. The Women of Troy, including Hecuba, the Queen, congregate and wait. They are in deep despair as they are to become slaves to the victorious Greeks and are awaiting the news of who will go where, and who will belong to whom.
Director, Emma Sproule’s interpretation, is set on the stage of the Golden Age of Hollywood and the key word in her interpretation is aftermath. Current Hollywood events seem the perfect prompt for a work that explores women who are disbelieved, disenfranchised and discarded when they are not the ones who wield the power, and sometimes even when they do.
Many years may pass for these stories to be told. Many may have endeavoured to embellish, exaggerate and even fabricate, even if they were not their stories to tell. So, imagine a stage of glamourous sirens and starlets, beautiful on the surface but slaves to an industry nonetheless.
Emma said, ”Once again, I find myself staggered by the relevance of classical works to our contemporary world. The Trojan Women explores the grief of a Queen stripped of power upon the death of her husband and an entire war blamed on the beauty and betrayal of a single women. The face that launched a thousand ships.
”I love the aesthetic of the Golden Age of Hollywood; so beautiful but also a façade, a distraction from ‘what lies beneath’; subterfuge, sleight of hand and special effects.
”If women are struggling to be heard now, imagine how stifled their voice then; we may never know what they wanted to say – even after the arrival of the talkies, they were expected to remain silent.”