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By Jennifer Chung for San Diego Union
Tribune "Ajax" is Sophocles' complex play about changing times and the downfall of the tragic hero. The ancient Greek tragedy now gets an intriguing staging at 6th@Penn in a translation by Marianne McDonald, but the play of still-relevant ideas lacks much of the emotional arc, tension and movement of the best Greek tragedies. Ajax is the second most powerful warrior
during the Trojan War after Achilles. He fights out of a sense of honor,
duty and perhaps pleasure. But it seems he is as expendable in times of
peace as he once was invaluable in war. The play opens while Ajax is still in the throes of his madness, having killed nearly all of the animals. If this sounds like a lot of exposition, it is, and it's mostly delivered in conversations between Odysseus and Athena (Erin McKown, wickedly enjoying Ajax's madness), and Ajax's slave-wife (Morgan Trant), and two of his sailors (Zach Guzik and Tara Donovan). Laurence Brown is a fine Ajax, swiftly moving through madness and desperation, vengeance, pouting, misery, shame and pride. With excellent diction and tone, Brown is powerfully commanding on stage. He delivers Ajax's famous speech about time and change in a manner that clearly delineates the play's themes, yet maintains the mystery behind his motivations.
Ajax's greatest fear is that men's memory is short – that warriors like him did society's dirty work but received no respect for their sacrifice and service, that they had no role in the era of peace. Think Vietnam veterans. In the speech, he suggests that everything – including friendship and hostility – is subject to change. Indeed, Ajax is living in a moment of transition, from the era of the hero to the era of the politician, from a time of action to a time of diplomacy and talk – much as we today seem to be moving toward an era of PR and media spin. But Ajax's tragic flaw is that he himself cannot, or will not, change. It is Odysseus, the politician, who changes and in a sense becomes the true hero of the play. He is the one who finally negotiates a peaceful resolution. While he first sneaks onto the stage anonymously, Max Macke's Odysseus is, especially by the play's end, not so much the golden-tongued, wily manipulator as a sober and sensible diplomat. Sophocles suggests – and McDonald's contemporary translation supports – that it is only through pity brought about by human suffering that moves us beyond the vindictiveness and endless cycle of eye-for-an-eye violence. In changing times, the need to adapt and forgive is of the utmost importance. The reason we still watch Greek tragedies is for their timelessness. While "Ajax" may not move us as emotionally as some others, it does carry a mighty intellectual, political impact – one that has references locally as well as on the national level. Playwright: Sophocles, translated by Marianne McDonald. Director: Forrest Aylsworth. Set: Amanda Stephens. Lighting: Elvira Perez. Costumes: Jeannie Galioto. Projection designer: Paul Savage. Cast: Laurence Brown, Max Macke, Erin McKown, Zach Guzik, Tara Donovan, Morgan Trant, Megan Fonseca, Brandon Walker, Patricia Elmore Costa, Fred Harlow. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DATEBOOK -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Ajax"
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