• Production review

Alone in the world, Electra, wracked with grief, plans revenge for the murder of her father. Daughter of the slain Agamemnon, vengeance for his death is her bloodrite. But how is she to proceed when her father's murderer is his wife and Electra's own mother?

The production offers a "psychological take" on the play, its most distinctive feature being the replacement of Electra and the Chorus of Women with five Electras, each representing a different facet of her personality without becoming abstraction, caught between the onstage symbols of the degraded house of her father, the tree that becomes a memorial to her brother, and a seven-metre shrine to Apollo. The interpretation resolves the difficulty of representing the Chorus without undermining the theatricality of the play: chorus sections are musicalised in different combinations of singing and chant including percussion by the cast, and battles with Electra become internal argument. At moments such as the reconciliation with her brother Orestes, however, the Electras are unified in action, representing a movement towards unity of purpose.