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Translated and adapted by Dana Gioia
Seneca’s The Madness of Hercules
Genres:
Theater
Runtime:
65 Minutes
No intermission
Tickets Start at:
$30
Expect an intimate, intense evening, close enough to feel a hero's rage up close.
Hercules returns from the underworld, but Juno isn't finished with him. She sends the Furies to meet him, and his hardest fight turns out to be with his own anger. This is a semi-staged reading, with actors, some staging, and production elements, presented in the spirit of how Seneca's plays are believed to have first been shared: in a small room, for a few listeners. Poet Dana Gioia's English version makes the 2,000-year-old play feel immediate.
It's a rare chance to hear Seneca, the Roman thinker known for Stoic ideas about keeping your head, spoken aloud. Bring a friend who likes a good argument about anger.
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Credits
Jim Rhodes, Executive Producer
Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles and Sierra Madre Playhouse present
Seneca's The Madness of Hercules
Translated and adapted by Dana Gioia
Directed by Ben Donenberg
About the Play
Given up for dead by friends, family, and the citizens of Thebes, Hercules emerges triumphant from the Underworld, where he was sent by Juno, the jilted wife of his father, Jupiter. Enraged by Jupiter's infidelities and by her failure to destroy Hercules, Juno unleashes the Furies to thwart him on his return home. In his most formidable challenge, the Furies force Hercules to confront his own rage.
Poet Dana Gioia's translation illuminates the contemporary urgency of Seneca's Stoic philosophy and its profound influence on Western theater.
"This is the finest single rendition into English of any Seneca work." Engelsberg Ideas
About the Performance
This is a staged reading. Actors appear courtesy of Actors' Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers.
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Credits
Jim Rhodes, Executive Producer
Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles and Sierra Madre Playhouse present
Seneca's The Madness of Hercules
Translated and adapted by Dana Gioia
Directed by Ben Donenberg
About the Play
Given up for dead by friends, family, and the citizens of Thebes, Hercules emerges triumphant from the Underworld, where he was sent by Juno, the jilted wife of his father, Jupiter. Enraged by Jupiter's infidelities and by her failure to destroy Hercules, Juno unleashes the Furies to thwart him on his return home. In his most formidable challenge, the Furies force Hercules to confront his own rage.
Poet Dana Gioia's translation illuminates the contemporary urgency of Seneca's Stoic philosophy and its profound influence on Western theater.
"This is the finest single rendition into English of any Seneca work." Engelsberg Ideas
About the Performance
This is a staged reading. Actors appear courtesy of Actors' Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers.