A ten year labor of love…
Odysseus DOA has been a ten-year labor of love. I started writing the play in 2001 as a graduate student at Ohio University. I wanted to write a play that captured my own personal experience with HIV, but I also wanted to create something that spoke to bigger issues of loss and what it means to have lived a worthy life. The play confronts my greatest fear; losing the capacity to communicate. Elliot, the protagonist of the play, is very much a stand-in for me. He’s a writer and a bit socially awkward, and as his mind crumbles from his illness, he escapes into his own fantasy world inspired by his favorite book, Homer’s The Odyssey.
The play deals with lofty themes; death, personal glory, and the necessary separation that comes between mother and child. It is truly a play about letting go. To present these ideas I was inspired by the Greek tragedy of Aeschylus and the choral theater of Alienation of Bertolt Brecht. The fusion of these two styles creates a realm of epic fantasy and pure theatricality. I also think that all tragedy must be balanced by a healthy amount of comedy. So after throwing in quite a few AIDS jokes – because if we can’t laugh at pain and illness what else can we do – and a dash of the humane humor of Paula Vogel, the play was born.
Odysseus DOA is not a play about AIDS. Yes, AIDS is in it, but just like I am not a person whose life is solely about my disease, the play expands beyond an examination of AIDS and becomes a study on how to live. So many plays about AIDS focus on the isolation of the disease and the political and social ramifications. The humanity of those living with the disease is forgotten.In this play Elliot and his “crew” of fellow patients actually create a community. They find that AIDS doesn’t destroy their lives, but rather it is in fact the catalyst or “super power” that makes them truly live.
Odysseus DOA opens this Friday January 21st at the Red House Arts Center in Syracuse, NY and runs through January 29th. The production will then have a limited engagement production in New York City at the Lion Theatre at Theatre Row.
-Stephen Svoboda
Executive Director
