Written by Nazli Tabatabai-Khatambakhsh after Euripides

Directed by Philip Howard

Tickets from £16.00

Some stories are inescapable in their evolution; contemporary rewrites on myth and legend become more numerous in our attempts to revisit them with a renewed lens and offer voices to the once silenced. And when captured with deft intelligence, gallus tongues, and some rather exceptional casting, well, you get something pretty special like Medea on the Mic.

The magnificent exploration of Nazli Tabatabai-Khatambakhsh’s new writing cracks open Euripides’ classic Greek tragedy, tangibly resonating through the theatrical space with humour, fire, and lighting pace. The re-telling shifts elements, particularly the Glaswegian influences and humour, but maintains the stead-beats of the classic piece, doing wonderful things with the elements of Medea’s motherhood and power with a sense of deserved reclamation through language. Medea has always been a proto-feminist text, and now Tabatabai-Khatambakhsh can place full autonomy into the hands where it should always have been.

An almost biographical structure, complete with the stand microphones and radio-station context, Hannah Jarrett-Scott’s central role as the demi-god come princess-sorceress takes audiences through Medea’s travels across Greece to Persia (with a couple stops in Berlin and New York) and their run-in with lovers, nuns, and murder. Historical therapy is the name of the game here, as Medea opens up in this queer re-telling, featuring music and an impactful soundscape to lay down the dirt on their story and the truth about their relationship with their bitter ex, Jason of the Argonauts.

One of the cleverer (this show has many) elements of the show is Jarret-Scott’s Medea and their natural ability to hold the audience without demand or visible effort. Its tremendously effective performance control, intrigue, and charisma invite the audience into the tale from the start. Medea is both imbued and somehow transcendent in their story: putting forward their experiences while demonstrating the language of Tabatabai-Khatambakhsh’s writing with fantastic respect and focus.

Petulant, never-satisfied, and still coasting on the Golden Fleece fame, Reuben Joseph’s Jason is in many ways the definition of a ‘red flag’ and proof of why most ‘bros’ should require licenses before getting podcasts. Their pouting and broodish attitudes are matched only by the narcissistic tendencies to keep his ship afloat in this splendid performance from Joseph, their face-pulling and sulking behind other performers never distracting but reinforcing everything Jarrett-Scott’s Medea is talking about. And yet, for all the bluster and ego, there’s an undeniable vulnerability and conflict, mercifully not enough to ever ‘forgive’, and all still ties back into the overarching elements of manipulation and patriarchy within the show, Philip Howard pushes for uncomfortable eye contact with the audience just a small part of their canny direction.

Rounding out this stacked casting is a splendid performance from naturally gifted storyteller Marc Mackinnon as The Chariot Queen. In what is often used for moments of levity and to tame turbulence, Mackinnon’s role is a vital one, a shimmering breath of light amidst the troubled waters, possessing an echo of the famous Greek Chorus. And robbing the costume budget, Mackinnon’s decked-out stance of sequins and trinkets isn’t a candle to their vocal quality: the same is true across the entire trio.

Similar to the preceding The Funeral Club, the only limitations here are found in the new writing set-up: timing and pace. Things which are naturally cobbled out with further runs and (hopefully) revived performances. Howard’s intimate direction pulls focus to the sound and cast, even with the accomplished stripped-back design work from Kenny Miller. It truly is a production for the ears, where the storytelling capabilities of the vocal ranges, effects, and harmony tell as lucrative and succinct a story as possible.

These past weeks at Oran Mor have been the best for the season thus far. Coaxing classical tragedies into a re-dressed contemporary tale, one armed with innovation and wit, makes Medea on the Mic production audiences will be keen to hear (and see) again and again.

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