Sarah Ruhl presents the her version of the story from the perspective of Eurydice as she encounters the character of her father in the afterlife and becomes genuinely tempted to either leave with her husband, Orpheus, and head off to the land of the living, or stay with her father in the land of the dead.

I did not find the play very satisfying.  Firstly Orpheus’ main power comes from the beautiful music he is able to create to open the doors of death and win the chance to bring back his bride – but in this production there was almost NO music and certainly nothing that amounted to more than a few notes.  I really didn’t care about the two lovers.  True, they had some beautiful lines but they had very little chemistry and they were so busy coughing up tears that I just couldn’t connect with them.  I could see where the inspiration to this play came from an opera.  It seemed as if this was from an opera and someone had taken away the big, massive score and left the rather impotent, sketched out dialogue to hold all the big feelings – – well they just didn’t.   To me it felt like a big opera/musical being performed on a day that the musicians just didn’t show up and everyone just had to speak their way through the play.  We were just missing something so badly.

What really worked for the production was the incredible set and costume design.  Elevators, water showers, oversized tricycles, and macabre costuming really gave us a thrilling visual element to the story that carried the audience to another time and place.    See the play and you will be amazed and entertained – – listen and you will not find much.