There are moments in Penthesilea that are agonising: the heroine, covered in blood, mourns the death of Achilles, the only warrior worthy of her love. The sparse scenography hides the cast in oppressive darkness while the dense language of Eline Arbo’s adaptation of Heinrich Von Kleist’s tragedy conjures a world filled with the vicious clash of armies, passions and cultures. Imitating the structure described by Aristotle, this production carves out a visceral modernity from the plot’s tragic tensions, illustrating the danger of desire and the inevitability of misery.

Yet other moments are misguided: an over-wrought version of a U2 song exaggerates the emotions into parody and Penthesilea’s rage did not need an ersatz Joy Division number to prove that ‘She’s Lost Control’. These moments only distract from the bleak intensity, transforming drama into pastiche. And the early scenes, drenched in musical numbers, drag until the action reaches the meeting of Achilles and the Amazon queen, in bed and in battle. 

Penthesilea speaks to the enduring theatricality of classically orientated tragedy (Von Kleist was adapting it for the Enlightenment, and Arbo drags it into the 21st century) boldly presenting its emotive power and intrinsic misogyny, but without clarifying whether it retains a moral resonance.

Penthesilea reviewed at Lyceum Theatre as part of Edinburgh International Festival.