Cate Blanchett’s Electra/Persona at the National Theatre is a surreal triumph

By Will Shüler, Vice-Dean of Education and Senior Lecturer, School of Performing and Digital Arts, Royal Holloway, University of London

Written and directed by Benedict Andrews, Electra/Persona is two plays conjoined. The first is a version of Sophocles’ ancient Greek tragedy Electra, and the second is a stage adaptation of the 1966 Ingmar Bergman film Persona.

In Sophocles’ play, Electra seeks vengeance for her father, Agamemnon, who upon returning from war was murdered by her mother, Clytemnestra.

Clytemnestra feels justified in the killing because Agamemnon sacrificed her first-born daughter, Iphigenia, to win the gods’…

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