Over its 10-year history, Britain's most dedicated specialists in ancient drama, Actors of Dionysus, have expanded their work to include university courses, audio-books and even leisure wear: the merchandising stand at the company's performances sells T-shirts bearing the motto: "making Greek tragedy seriously sexy".
I doubt whether Aeschylus will ever be considered the epitomy of cool, although the Orestia does makes sex seem seriously tragic. The abduction of Helen sparks a sequence of libidinous displacements, with Agamemnon meeting his fate the moment he steps back into the marital orbit. David Stuttard's production seeks to emphasise the sex-death parallels by departing from Greek decorum and putting a languorously choreographed slaughter sequence on stage.
This is not his only deviation from Aeschylean propriety. The herald is heard announcing the end of the siege of Troy by exclaiming: "Oh man, there's gonna be parties". But Stuttard's most serious break with his source is to dispense with the chorus - without which, you could argue, Greek tragedy loses its moral fulcrum and degenerates into a parade of egotistical maniacs murdering one another.
The parts are shared among a quartet of actors, issued with shift dresses and a flimsy jungle-gym set to drape themselves around. The verse-speaking is very good, but the portentous movement direction seems to conflict with the colloquial translation.
The actors' dedication to a single goal is to be applauded, but the pursuit of sex appeal for its own sake seems a little crass, while performing without a chorus - even for economic reasons - undermines the integrity of the repertoire.
To give Greek tragedy a truly modern context requires either the stark purism of John Barton and Peter Hall's staging of Tantalus, or the pugilistic free adaptation of a Steven Berkoff. Actors of Dionysus aim somewhere in the middle, and the result seems inevitably a bit hit and myth.
· At QEH Theatre, Bristol (0117-9250 551), Tuesday and Wednesday, then touring.
