AGAMEMNON at St. Veronica’s Church Director Gisela Cardenas eschews trends with her invigorating staging of Agamemnon. Rather than underscoring the theme of war’s enduring scars, she stresses the play’s domestic brutality. The result is pungently visceral, concisely linking Clytemnestra’s murders of Agamemnon and Cassandra to the cannibalistic acts that left a curse on the House of Atreus. Set designer Jian Jung, who’s swathed the space in pale yellow fabric, provides four large tables that Cardenas’ well-marshaled chorus (dressed by costume designer Oana Botez-Ban as kitchen help) shifts as the events of the play tragically unfurl. An aroma coming from a pot that simmers at one end of the space heightens the audience’s sense of the tragedy brewing from the moment Clytemnestra learns of the Trojan War’s end to the final tableau: Agamemnon’s naked body literally served across a banquet table. Cardenas’ adaptation uses various translations of Aeschylus’ play and integrates contemporary sources, including recipes (generally heard in the choral interludes, which are led by a powerful David Arkema as the servant Archestratos), making the bloody hunger of the piece frighteningly palpable. Combined with the household pets seen throughout (Andrea Gastelum’s redheaded wire-body dog puppets are manipulated with ferociousness by Lucy Alibar, Sara Buffamanti, and Gastelum, who metamorphose into the Furies), the director’s vision of domestic tragedy feels completely realized. Linda Park provides a beautifully realized Clytemnestra, arcing grandly from madness to cool calculation to, finally, murderous revenge. Jonathan Co Green offers a regal if beaten down portrayal of the Greek general Agamemnon. Catherine Friesen plays multiple roles, notably a bitterly ironic Cassandra, with skill. Cardenas does not completely ignore the effects of the war. As the messenger who describes the battles preceding Troy’s fall, Seth Powers gives a volcanically charged portrayal of a man suffering posttraumatic stress syndrome, providing the final necessary layer to this satisfying staging. Presented by the Vortex Theater Company at St. Veronica’s Church, 149 Christopher St., NYC, Oct. 19–Nov. 11. Wed.–Fri., 8 p.m. (212) 352-3101. Reviewed by Andy Propst Published on BackStage.com on October 25, 2005. Copyright 2005 VNU Business Media, Inc. All rights reserved.