Radio review: The Oresteia - The Furies

When I started listening to and reviewing Radio 3's 2014 Oresteia earlier this week, I suggested a couple of practical reasons why we don't really see theatres staging it as three separate plays, instead usually getting a playwright to create a single epic out of them. Getting to the end of the trilogy, it also suggests how on an artistic and storytelling level it would make quite an unusual experience for modern audiences. Of course one reason the jump from one play to the next is quite jarring is that this production took the idea of treating them as separate plays to its natural conclusion, entrusting each to a different writer. Rebecca Lenkiewicz takes over for The Furies, with Sasha Yevtushenko directing as Orestes (Will Howard,) who was last seen fleeing the titular ancient goddesses because he murdered his mother (in revenge for her murdering his father, in revenge for him murdering their daughter,) arrives at Apollo's temple in Delphi for sanctuary.

Theatre review: Dido, Queen of Carthage

No good deed goes unpunished for Dido, Queen of Carthage in the latest Christopher Marlowe play to get an RSC revival in the Swan. After the fall of Troy, Aeneas (Sandy Grierson) leads the only surviving Trojan warriors on an expedition to create a new colony in Italy. On the way they're shipwrecked on the coast of Libya but Aeneas has friends in high places - his mother is the goddess Venus (Ellie Beaven,) who ensures everyone survives, even if their ships don't. There's more good luck because Libya was an ally of Troy's, and Queen Dido (Chipo Chung) greets the men as honoured guests, offering them lives of honour and luxury in Carthage. This still isn't enough for Venus, though, who wants Dido to give her son her own fleet to replace the one he lost. Being the goddess of love she knows just the way to do it, making Dido fall in love with Aeneas and pledge him her entire navy. The catch is she wants him to stay and be her king.