She can no longer stomach the size of her sorrow, Electra says, but neither can the others at Aegisthus’ court. Her mother, her sister and the chorus, all want her to stop lamenting Agamemnon’s death. Her father, killed years ago by her mother Clytemnestra and step father Aegisthus, hovers over Electra as a soul-sucking memory leaving her gaunt and hollow and incapable of pursuing anything else in life. She cries out to the gods about the unjust punishment she is receiving and she wishes for nothing more to revenge her father.
There is no hope for any life and redemption to return to the cursed house of Agamemnon. A massive dead tree on the Old Vic’s in-the-round stage, designed by Mark Thompson, and Kristin Scott Thomas, swapping her upper class coolness for mental instability, circles it, throws herself in its shadow and generally strikes a miserable figure in her pauper’s gown.
Scott Thomas was very eager for a role in which she could use her face for more than calculated composure, and here she really goes for it. Disheveled, she thrashes around on the sandy floor while waiting for her brother Orestes to return and avenge the father. In the first half of the play we find Electra a wailing mess, like a less cunning Hamlet moaning about and accusing the matricidal mother to anyone who will listen.
When you join a character in the middle of a sustained nervous breakdown there’s usually little way left to follow them down the psychological rabbit hole. So what we witness here is a woman who, after mourning for years, slowly begins to gain her wits again, finding resolve and coming apart again. It’s in this bipolar realm of emotions that Kristin Scott Thomas can show off her range and as everyone tries to reason with her she loosens up a bit, charging between spite, incredulity and more woe.
There’s a palpable barrier between Electra and the people with whom she is forced to interact. Liz White’s Chrysothemis can’t get through to her grieving sister and it shows plainest in their physical interactions. Even when they are on the same page when it comes to questions of honour or revenge their touches and embraces are brief and indecisive. When her saviour, younger brother Orestes, finally shows up their connection feels vague and insincere. They clutch each other awkwardly, the kisses are cold and vague and are fuelled by the fact that Jack Lowden constantly tries to shake the madwoman off him so the revenge plot doesn’t get spoiled.
Maybe some of this stems from the feeling that Thomas is in a different play to the rest of the cast. With her almost modern conversational and spluttering speech and her far from majestic gesticulations, she’s royalty fallen from grace, an outcast of the court because of her erratic behaviour. Diana Quick’s Clytemnestra sobs dry tears, retching emotionally but always aiming to keep up the regal façade, and when Thomas verbally spars with her there is an unavoidable jarring between these two styles of performance; it feels as if something about this potent mother-daughter conflict has fallen through the cracks.
All the while Liz White’s composure in the face of all the wretchedness her sister goes through is wavering. She is not necessarily as detached from her sister’s sorrow as other Chrysothemis that have come before her. However, her compassion makes any accusation of complicity Electra hurls her way somewhat superfluous. This Chrysothemis is not complicit, she’s a gormless pawn and White’s response to the matter is the ever-creasing brow of being conflicted.
PJ Harvey’s non-diegetic music while ominous is used merely as decoration and adds no further layer to the inevitability of the tragedy. Of course, there are some issues with Sophocles’ text itself. Aegisthus (Tyrone Huggins) only shows up in the last few minutes but he has the most important line in the whole play. Will we keep on murdering? Is there no way to stop the spiral of violence? “Is this house forever cursed?” Look at Electra’s hollow eyes and the dead tree that’s reflected in them and you know the answer. This woman has suffered too much to let it go. This inability to let go of resentment is at the core of a lot of human conflict. The text naturally lends itself to an exploration of this theme and it’s somewhat surprising that Ian Rickson’s version balks at pursuing this aspect in more depth.
Crucially, Sophocles’ play does not allow for female self-empowerment however twisted and misguided it might turn out to be. Electra suffers but she stays pure in her actions and bids others to her work for her. How different to Euripides’ Medea, this year’s other Greek tragedy featuring a female big name star. Helen McCrory’s tragic heroine could be seen digging much deeper into the pain of being abandoned and outcast than Thomas does in this unembellished production.
Electra
