The Classics Are Not Finished With Us

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey has turned one of the oldest works of Western literature into a global box-office phenomenon. Its scale, technological ambition and immersive spectacle offer one model for bringing an ancient story into the present.

At Tel Aviv University, another Greek classic is being reinvented through almost the reverse process: not expansion, but compression.

The TAU Theatre’s new production of Sophocles’ Oedipus the King, adapted and directed by Ariel N. Wolf, places the entire tragedy in the hands of three graduates of the acting track: Rea Deshe, Hagar Zander and Amit Lasri. Using Aharon Shabtai’s Hebrew translation, they move rapidly between the play’s characters, its narrators and their own presence as performers.

Reconstructing a Familiar Tragedy

Because Oedipus the King is already so familiar, the production does not depend on suspense. Instead, it asks how a story told for more than two thousand years can come alive again. “In our Oedipus the King, we are not looking for the grand, heroic characters, quite the opposite: we are looking for the small, ordinary people,” says Hagar Zander. 

The three performers share the entire text, constantly “jumping” from one character to another, while also wearing the narrator’s hat. Roles are assumed, interrupted and passed between them, allowing the audience to watch both the drama and the process through which it is created. The performers must therefore work as what Rea Desheh calls a “three-headed monster”: three individuals functioning as extensions of one another, sharing text and movement while shifting between tragedy, irony and grotesque humour.

The production presents the 2000-year-old play in a new light. (Photo: Simcha Barabiro)

“All of this serves the director’s [Ariel Wolf's] interpretation, according to which Oedipus was not the victim—the people are. Oedipus does not want to see or investigate the truth, and the people pay the price,” Hagar explains.

By placing its theatrical machinery in full view, the production dismantles the classic only to rebuild it. One actor can contain several characters; narration can become dialogue or commentary; three bodies and voices can evoke a much larger world. Where Nolan’s The Odyssey magnifies an ancient epic, Tel Aviv University’s Oedipus the King compresses Sophocles to the essentials of performance and storytelling, forcing the audience to discover the work anew.

A Laboratory for Classical Works

Oedipus the King is the inaugural production of “The Lab,” a new framework within the TAU Theatre that brings together graduates of the Department of Theatre Arts, current students, faculty members and theatre professionals.

TAU Theatre Director Alon Tiran describes The Lab as “a platform for professional, contemporary and innovative creation,” based on the active participation of the department’s graduates alongside its academic and professional staff and students.

Its purpose is to create a space in which academic study and professional theatre-making can develop together. As Prof. Yair Lipshitz. Head of the Department of Theater Arts,  and Yonathan Beck, the Theater’s Director of Education & Dramaturgy Department, write in the production’s program, the project seeks to “connect theoretical research with artistic practice, ancient classics with contemporary theatrical interpretation, and academia with schools and the education system.”

“The Lab” therefore treats the university not only as a place in which theatre is studied, but also as a place in which it can be tested through rehearsal and performance. Oedipus the King is The Lab’s inaugural production, and it is dedicated to the memory of Prof. Nurit Yaari, the former head of the Department of Theatre Arts and a leading scholar of classical Greek drama, whose work emphasized the connection between research and theatre as a living art.

Oedipus the King upcoming performances at TAU Theater are August 17&18 (in Hebrew). For tickets, please press here.