Hippolytus

Description

Furious that Prince Hippolytus will not worship her, Aphrodite, goddess of love, seeks revenge. Infecting Hippolytus' stepmother, Phaedra, with an overpowering desire for him, Aphrodite's retribution will sweep both prince and queen to a brutal end. A secret torment Storms through her Tosses her into that black harbour Death. Timberlake Wertenbaker's translation of Euripides' tragedy Hippolytus premiered at Riverside Studios, London, in February, 2009 in a production by Temple Theatre.

Euripides (c. 482-406 bc), dramatist of Ancient Greece. Eighteen of some ninety plays attributed to him have survived, among them Alcestis, Medea, Hippolytus, Andromache, Suppliant Women, Electra,Trojan Women, Iphigenia in Tauris, Heracles, Helen, Phoenician Women, Orestes and Bacchae. Timberlake Wertenbaker's plays include New Anatomies (ICA, London, 1982), Abel's Sister (Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 1984), The Grace of Mary Traverse (Royal Court), which won the Plays and Players Most Promising Playwright Award in 1985, Our Country's Good (Royal Court and Broadway), winner of the Laurence Olivier Play of the Year Award in 1988 and the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best New Foreign Play in 1991, The Love of the Nightingale (RSC's Other Place), which won the 1989 Eileen Anderson Central TV Drama Award, Three Birds Alighting on a Field (Royal Court), which won the Susan Smith Blackburn Award, Writers' Guild Award and London Critics' Circle Award in 1992, The Break of Day (Out of Joint production, Royal Court and tour, 1995), After Darwin (Hampstead Theatre, 1998), The Ash Girl (Birmingham Rep, 2000), Credible Witness (Royal Court, 2001), Galileo's Daughter (Theatre Royal, Bath, 2004), Arden City (NT Connections, 2008) and The Line (Arcola Theatre, 2009). She has written the screenplay of The Children, based on the novel by Edith Wharton, and a BBC2 film entitled Do Not Disturb. Translations and adaptations include Marivaux's La Dispute, Jean Anouilh's Leocadia, Maurice Maeterlinck's Pelleas and Melisande for BBC Radio, Ariane Mnouchkine's Mephisto, adapted for the RSC in 1986, Sophocles's The Theban Plays (RSC, 1991), Euripides' Hecuba (ACT, San Francisco, 1995; BBC Radio 3, 2001) and Hippolytus (Riverside Studios, 2009), Eduardo de Filippo's Filumena (Peter Hall Company at the Piccadilly Theatre, 1998), Pirandello's Come tu mi vuoi, Gabriela Preissova's Jenufa (Arcola Theatre, 2008) and Racine's Brittanicus (Wilton's Music Hall, 2011).