Adapting Sophocles’ monumental play for modern purposes whilst retaining its essential integrity is no mean feat. Frank McGuinness’ terse and economic use of words does not detract from the original text of Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex. If anything, it compliments and heightens its relevance for today’s audience. The tight, simple set revolving on its axis perfectly reflected time passing, whilst supporting Fiennes’ portrayal of Oedipus - a clean cut, distant, efficient politician with a mild distain for his advisors and subjects alike.

 

The Oedipus myth is well known: the man who is destined to murder his father and marry his mother, Freud made much mileage out of it, as does Fiennes, and his Oedipus is superb - a man with all of the trappings which modernity and power brings. His arrogance is his hubris. As Oedipus discovers more about his fate, he becomes wracked with doubt culminating in his retreat to a more honest, humble, pathetic and physically blind man. The atmosphere was electric when Oedipus, realising what he has done, lets out an animalistic howl of agony. His doting wife, Jocasta - played with deft, powerful control by Claire Higgins - compliments and mirrors his arrogance, as she too suffers from an all consuming self-serving denial.

 

What is so refreshing about seeing Oedipus now is that it has become a true classic - literally timeless. The Chorus’ pessimistic singing reflects Ancient Greece as much as echoing our era of doom and gloom. Homer began the chronicle of storytelling which became the cradle for western literary and dramatic civilisation, whilst Sophocles’ dramatic tragic form was inherited from Aeschylus. Such a form of storytelling via a main plot and sub plot is the very essence of all good modern drama and entertainment.

 

If there is anything to find fault with, it is the excessive modernisation of the text (which uses words like “terrorism” to make it more pertinent to out times. This felt like a trifling concern compared with the pared down, yet tremendously all-consuming, performance of Fiennes. To put it simply, Oedipus is the good solid stuff of which all drama is made, and I urge any one who has not yet had a chance to see this play to do so. It’s a real treat.

 

 

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