AT A GLANCE...

An ambitious adaptation of the Iliad and the Odyssey, with a rock music score. It follows the hero Odysseus and his wife Penelope through the end of the Trojan war and to his eventual homecoming, with a parallel plot set on an archaeological dig at Mycenae in 1902. A large ensemble piece with plenty of roles (singing and non-singing), puppetry, and epic set-pieces!

 

ROLES: c.30 speaking roles (some can be played by m/f) with flexible chorus including a number of additional small speaking roles. 

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MUSIC: 8 songs orchestrated for 7-piece band. The style is rock/epic/filmic. Mostly ensemble singing, some featured soloists. Other musical set-pieces, including opportunities for ambitious dance and physical theatre sequences.

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OVERVIEW

1200 BC. A woman waits and watches the sea from a clifftop. She is Penelope, wife of Odysseus, who has yet to return from the Trojan War after ten years. Their son, Telemachus, wonders whether he will ever be able to fill his legendary father’s place.

 

1902. A young Cambridge student, Winifred Kennedy, digs in the ruins of Mycenae, heartland of ancient Greece, under the stern and watchful eye of archaeologist Henry Allen. Teddy, his son, loathes everything about the ancient world, so Winifred takes it upon herself to bring the past alive for him, drawing father and son closer together. Her vivid story-telling takes us back three thousand years, to the epic world of Homer’s immortal tales, The Iliad and The Odyssey, where great warriors clash in single combat and a city’s fate hangs in the balance. Odysseus’s perilous journey home after the war is one of the greatest adventure stories ever told.

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This is a truly epic show, perfect for ambitious school, youth or amateur groups. The original production included puppetry and a huge flown-in Trojan horse head, but it is possible to stage the production on a less technically ambitious scale.

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Watch the short teaser below from the acclaimed 2024 Oxford Playhouse premiere.

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