The Furies - based on the Eumenides - was the 2014 production of The Oxford Greek Play performed at the Oxford Playhouse in October 2014. The director wished to set the play in a liminal world, caught between the old and the new, in which the decaying structures of Orestes world were present in the set as well as the language. The set established the production in a timeless, apocalyptic world, filled with the broken and transient remnants of a civilization in ruin, using a combination of jagged shapes and metallic structures to achieve this. Drawing upon the contorted shapes in Francis Bacon painting of the Furies, the set was comprised of looming abstract shapes sculpted from wire and fabric which framed the grand, yet broken, central altar. As these wire structures moved upwards throughout the play they represented in turn the cavernous underworld of the furies, the arched ceiling of the temple and the vaulted ceiling of a court of law until they exited the stage entirely, leaving a simple white canvas and red altar as the new age of civilization was realized within the script. The cyclorama allowed the angular internal structures of the sculptures to be revealed and disguised, in the same way that the red cloths could hide and reveal the shadowy figures of the Furies as they moved across the stage.

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'with its geometrical shapes, hard panels juxtaposed with soft, cavernous drapes, all drenched in an angry, nightmarish dark red – you are immediately gripped by an expressionist world of oppressive menace’ Oxford Culture Review

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'Visually, the set is gloriously evocative; great arcing swathes of drapery contrast with large, angular blocks... These elements move and the colours shift perceptibly as the play progresses, creating a series of impressive set-pieces.’ Cherwell

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Director- Arabella Curie

Designer- Abby Clarke

Lighting Designer- John Evans

Costume Designer- Phoebe Griffith

Sound Designer- James Percival

Composer- Joe Curie