Who?
In ancient times, he was a familiar character, a soldier who died for Troy. Though the Trojan War was not his fight – he’d come from Ethiopia to help his uncle, King Priam. So it’s a tragedy of a brave, good-hearted young man’s destruction. And yes, the Greeks, despite their chauvinism, always identified this noble hero as Black.
If the plays concerning him by Aeschylus and Sophocles had survived, we would know all about Memnon. There was also “Aethiopis”, an epic poem in five books, which we know existed, but don’t have. Perhaps one day a charred scroll will get deciphered and we’ll regain the full story.
But, in the meantime, with not many clues to go on, playwright Will Power and the Classical Theater of Harlem undertook a daunting job of reconstruction.
It worked. The characters and conflicts burst out of myth to illuminate the here and now. To whom do we owe loyalty? Our lives? What do those people and places owe us?
The Memnon, Eric Berryman, had an imposing presence and a repertoire of glares, exasperated stares. He vibrated with internal conflict.
Like lots of Getty Villa productions, the artists had fun with the classical antique bric-a-brac.
There was a Homeric catalog inventorying all the African troops under Memnon’s command and an epic description of Memnon’s shield based a similar one in the “Iliad”. Both were delivered by Daniel José Molina in vast, breath-defying narrative monologues peppered with tongue-twistingly-named gods, heroes, and places.
The dialogue had the cadences of verse, growing more emphatic till the play ended with characters speaking in rhymed couplets.
The production was stolen by the two old men – King Priam and the senior Greek warrior Nestor – embodied forcefully by one actor, Jesse J. Perez. His Priam was a corrupt self-absorbed political boss; his Nestor was a hypocritical, manipulative hysteric. Both takes were novel and provocative.
In addition to being identified as Black, the ancient references to Memnon also typically identify him as outstandingly good-looking. In the “Odyssey”, Memnon’s murderer, Achilles, describes another solider as the handsomest man he ever saw – except for Memnon. This production did not focus on that element of the story. Though at one moment Jesse Corbin – playing Achilles – peeled his shirt off and the wolf-whistles and hoots of approval probably exceeded the Getty’s neighbors’ request for decorum.
Image: “Memnon”, Abraham van Diepenbeeck (1655)
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