The second full-scale show in the Almeida's Greek season goes for the opposite aesthetic to the first: Where Robert Icke's
Oresteia not only brought Aeschylus into the 21st century cosmetically but also in a radical reworking of the text, James Macdonald brings back some of the original staging conventions of ancient Greece, specifically with regards to casting. All the named roles are played by the same three actors, while the chorus - who aren't
quite as authentic in that they're played by real women - speak or sing their lines in unison. The former convention leads to a bit of gender-bending, which is appropriate enough when the play is Euripides'
Bakkhai. Dionysus (Ben Whishaw,) best-known as the god of wine and revelry, is a fairly new addition to the pantheon of Olympus, in fact when we meet him much of his mortal mother's family are still alive, and it's they who will bear the brunt of the new god's wrath when they don't show him due respect.
