Oedipus
The Old Vic, London
 

STAR-STUDDED Oedipus productions appear to be very much in vogue in the West End. No sooner has Robert Icke’s production, starring Mark Strong and Lesley Manville at the Wyndham Theatre, finished than this Ella Hickson adaptation with Hollywood A-lister Rami Malek, of Bohemian Rhapsody fame, and Game of Thrones star Indira Varma, begins.

Malek is about as oddball an Oedipus as they come. His diminutive, imp-like presence and distinctive US drawl is not quite what you expect from the tragic Greek hero. Yet these eccentricities make him all the more captivating to watch, in what proves to be a strangely unique telling of the classic Sophocles play.

For starters, the Matthew Warchus production teams up with contemporary dance group, the Hofesh Shechter Company, whose 10 dancers become the chorus. Their show-stopping physical feats see their bodies twist and contort with abandon, like tripped-out clubbers at a techno rave, serving as exhilarating chapter-breaks as the drama unravels.

Tom Visser’s lighting and Rae Smith’s set are sparse but effective. Oedipus approaches against a giant sun-drenched backdrop to address the audience — or Theban plebs — via a vintage microphone.

In a nod to the climate crisis, drought is the curse that threatens Thebes, not the plague. Oedipus urges the city dwellers to up sticks and leave. 

Yet his ultimate downfall is sealed after consulting the oracle at Delphi — whose answer is bizarrely played back on a fairly inaudible reel-to-reel tape — and later the blind prophet Tiresias (formidably played by Cecilia Noble), setting in motion the age-old battle between the adage that “knowledge is power and ignorance is bliss.”

Much of the dialogue revolves around the weight of their prophecies. Nicholas Khan, as an ambitious and hectoring Creon in a priestly cassock, is unbudgeable in his zealous support for them — understandably so, as he would be their main beneficiary. Varma’s sceptical Jocasta, frequently providing comic relief, sarcastically points out that “a raving hermit” might not be the answer to their problems. 

The flaw of such a well-told story as Oedipus is that everyone knows what's coming — and it would appear even the cast themselves, whose reaction to the abominable truth once the penny has finally dropped is more muted than hysterical. 

A worthy if disjointed rendering. 

Runs until March 29. Box office: 0344 871-7628, www.oldvictheatre.com.