The
tradgedy of Medea has been retold many times since Euripedes. The poet
Robinson Jeffers did a
version which made it to
Broadway in the
Forties.
My favorite version, however, is Medea the Musical by a Bay Area Wunderkin John Fisher which is currently touring the country. The show is a delightfully layered and self-referential farce about a theater company which has decided for whatever reason to put on a musical version of Medea. The lead actor playing Jason is a self-identified gay who ends up sleeping with and confused about the lead actress playing Medea. The result is a surprising and deliciously postmodern, post-AIDS, post-Gay Power look at sexual identity and the Goddess of Love. Worth the price of admission just to see the Aphrodite number sung to the tune of Barry Manilow's Copacabana with the entire cast in huge Afro wigs which includes the chorus, "Yes, She's Afro, Aphrodite:/ The power of Venus enlarges the penis."