Tom and I went to the Teatro Armando Manzanero tonight to see a Musical Comedy performance of Lysistrata.
Lysistrata is one of the few surviving plays written by Aristophanes, originally performed in Athens in 411 BC.
Tonight’s performance was based on that original play, loosely based. It's adaptation and direction are by Ricardo Adrian, and was performed by the State Theater Company and RIA Theater Company.
just to bring you up to speed -
This play is a comic account of Lysistrata's mission to end The Peloponnesian War. Lysistrata persuades the women of Greece to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace, and to have the older women seize the Akropolis —
This adaptation, in Spanish I might add, is a bawdy account of a bunch of horny women trying to be harnessed by Lysistrata to affect her plan to end the war. This was a cast of 7 performers, and all but one were men.
I didn't get all the context, but I got enough to know they were using a lot of slang and innuendo As well as a lot of current day references.
It was quite funny, and unfortunately poorly attended, which surprises me since it was free, and air conditioned.
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| Lysistrata |
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| The Commissioner |
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| this one is a bad photo, but it allows you to see how they've addressed the Chorus, look up high. The chorus was a central feature of Greek performance, they gave important information that would have been otherwise difficult to transfer to the audience. |
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| Kinesias, and Myrrhine |
It was a fun performance, and if you are here in Merida I highly suggest you go, even if you don't think you'll get. Just read a synopsis of Lysistrata so you understand the story.
check this link for Yucatan Living for more dates and times