Eurydice

We went with a friend to see a modern retelling of "Eurydice" the other day. In the original (which I didn't remember and had to look up) Orpheus and Eurydice fall in love. He makes such wonderful music that the very gods rejoice. Then Eurydice dies. Orpheus's music becomes so sad that the gods weep. They are moved to allow Orpheus to enter the underworld and lead Eurydice out -- as long as he doesn't look back at her until they reach the land of the living again. He does look back, and he loses her forever.

The modern version is told from Eurydice's viewpoint. Which sounds interesting and all except she's, you know, dead, so there's not much going on with her. Some of the other creatures of the underworld are interesting, but she herself is kind of a cipher -- and since she's far and away the most important character in the play, that's rather a large drawback. Add to that the fact that she doesn't seem to miss Orpheus all that much, or even be very upset about (or very much inconvenienced by) being dead, and that there's little if any explanation of how she died in the first place or why she calls to Orpheus, getting him to turn and look at her as he's leading her out of the underworld, and you wind up with a pretty unsatisfying play.

Fortunately, I went with two hot babes so the the evening was great fun despite the disappointing show.