Dec 26, 2009

Medea | On Stage: Selected Theater Reviews from The New York Times

In the following review, which originally appeared in the New York Times on October 21, 1947, Atkinson offers praise for Robinson Jeffers's adaptation ofBuripedes's Medea. His review illustrates how ancient Greek dramas can be altered slightly or extensively without changing the messages intended by the original authors. Such adaptations can make these dramas more accessible to modern audiences.

If Medea does not entirely understand every aspect of her whirling character, she would do well to consult Judith Anderson. For Miss Anderson understands the character more thoroughly than Medea Euripides or the scholars, and it would be useless now for anyone else to attempt the part. Using a new text by Robinson Jeffers, she set a landmark in the theatre at the National last evening, where she gave a burning performance in a savage part.

Mr. Jeffers' "free adaptation," as it is called, spares the supernatural bogeymen...