Mud, steel pipes, a metal band. Blood from the ceiling. Mud on the ground, and thrown at one another. Not deus ex machina but dead children rising from the ground. Ivo Von Hove’s Age of Rage is a marathon of familial betrayal, ancient Greek style. Starting with Agamemnon and the gods’ edict to sacrifice Iphigenia to secure victory and retrieve Helen from Troy, and ending with Orestes and Electra’s murder of their mother and her new husband, the production traces the linkage across the family tree. What normally spans multiple plays and a good 20+ years in storyline is served to us in a driving 3 hrs 45 minutes.
The production employs a metal band live on stage, accompanying the action like a musical score to great effect, and choreography which takes place on the main stage area and also on a far upstage area, obscured by a lit scrim which also serves as the door — to another room, to outside, to the afterlife. Bodies move about the stage in writhing choreography, but the production works best when it strips back the chorus dancers and is just solo actors in extended monologues, wailing at the injustice of the world.
It was at times too long. I could have done with fewer dance interludes, and occasionally a faster pace, however these quibbles are outshone by an unnerving commitment to the concept. My only other complaint is simply that given the choice of aesthetic, some performances almost felt too tidy. Clytemnestra stood out for me as a beautifully messy performance. Mud covered, sweaty, dress nearly falling off and toppling across the mud in knee high heeled boots, the absurdity of this woman and her situation were undeniable.
The impact of combining the stories, however, was a powerful one — quite simply, it reminded us that Greek Tragedy is mainly men doing stupid things which cause pain and suffering to the women and children around them, who in turn overreact, and enact stupidity on others. On and on and on.