Medea CD

£18.50

A blistering story of a woman scorned and her terrifying revenge on the husband who has betrayed her for a young heiress.

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Description

Written for performance in Athens in 431 BC, Medea is the blistering story of a woman scorned and her terrifying revenge on the husband who has betrayed her for a young heiress.

Popular in antiquity and in the modern world alike (it was a favourite of the Suffragettes) the play contains unusually acute observations of female psychology, as it traces Medea’s spiral from rejected wife to daemonic child-killer. Many of the questions that it raises remain potent today: how far should we sympathise with Medea: and what should we make of the play’s ending?

This recording by Actors of Dionysus was first issued in 1996 by Penguin Audiobooks with music composed by Olive Hamilton

Translated and directed by David Stuttard

Complete and Unabridged

Total time; 99’ 25” (CD1 51’42” : CD2 47’43”)

Cast

Roger Braban – Aegeus
Lizzie Cox & Anton Mirto – Chorus
Maria Fierheller – Nurse
Mark Katz – Jason
John Kingsley – Tutor
Anthony Ofoegbu – Creon
Tamsin Shasha – Medea
David Stuttard – Messenger

Running time: Approx 90 mins – Double CD
Age guidance: 12+

Reviews

“Actors of Dionysus give an astonishingly tense and absorbing performance. David Stuttard’s translation gives Euripides’ wisdom a classic turn of phrase which the well-balanced chorus puts over perfectly. Anthony Ofoegbe is suitably Doric as Creon, Mark Katz makes an insufferably pi Jason, and Tamsin Shasha is chillingly convincing as the mad but marvellous Medea”. – The Independent

“Good performances all round, and especially by Tamsin Shasha in the title role, makes it very clear why the Greeks were so excited by this play more than a millennium ago”. – Financial Times

Reviews of other performances and recordings:

“Stuttard’s sensitive and powerful translation keeps the force of the drama moving…Actors of Dionysus leave behind in their audiences an experience of deep intensity.” – St Andrews Citizen, on Electra

“A very important teaching aid.” – The Open University

“Performed with an energy and passion that matched the superb staging, direction and design.” – The Argus, on Agamemnon