‘Women of Troy’ is a painful lesson on casualties of war

PHOTO by KEITH IAN POLAKOFF

Women of Troy opens on a meeting between gods, Poseidon (Juan Carlos Parada) and Athena (Ivana Karapandzic) considering a just-wrapped 10-year war (victorious Greeks on one side, Trojans on the other) and, here comes the sort of interesting twist for Team America—the gods smile upon the benighted Trojans. But that’s it: just a kind of patronizing fist bump and the implied promise of some silver-lined meteorological formation. It’s something you’ll see again and again in your Western Civ class—God sending his people into Babylonian, Persian and Egyptian captivity; surrendering Job to Satan; sacrificing Jesus to the crucifixion. We could go on (Aztecs, etc.), but watch and read enough and you reach the conclusion that the gods must be lazy. We’re down with the people, they say, can someone get us a sandwich?

Euripides turns on its head the familiar Homeric accounts of the Trojan war—there are no heroes, quests, martial glory, bravery or cheating hearts in his account; out there is the graveyard city of Troy, its heroes rotting in the sun, its women living their last free days before death, maybe, and almost certain inter-ethnic insemination. The forlorn Trojan queen Hecuba (Leah Harshaw), now dressed up for auction, joins the chorus in crying the loss of almost everything.

The Cal State Long Beach’s University Players cast is terrific, fully pissed off in the face of the more powerful Greeks, boiling over into all-out rage against the deus in the machina. You can’t help thinking about contemporary politics, and wondering what side you’re on.

— With assistance by Rob Walsh

WOMEN OF TROY STUDIO THEATRE | CAL STATE LONG BEACH | 1250 BELLFLOWER BLVD | LONG BEACH 90840 | CSULB.EDU/DEPTS/THEATRE | 562.985.5526 | WED-THURS 7PM | FRI 8PM | SAT 2&8PM | $12-15 THROUGH APRIL 12

Tags: cal state long beach, Long Beach, theatre, women of troy