Press Release

SITI COMPANY RETURNS TO THE GETTY VILLA FOR BACCHAE BY EURIPIDES

Co-produced by SITI Company, directed by Anne Bogart,

and translated by Aaron Poochigian

Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays 
September 6–September 29, 2018
At the J. Paul Getty Museum, Getty Villa

Packed with striking scenes, frenzied emotion, and choral songs of great power and beauty, Bacchae endures as one of Euripides’s greatest surviving works. Dionysus, the god of wine, ritual madness, fertility, and theater, arrives in disguise at his birthplace in Greece. As revenge for a personal slight, he begins to spread his cult among the people of Thebes. His adversary King Pentheus, fearing the ensuing disorder, imprisons him to suppress his influence. This misguided attempt to thwart divine will leads to catastrophe for Pentheus and his entire family. The bacchants called Dionysus "the god of letting go," reminding us to respect our human wildness. Otherwise we may fall prey to the tyranny of excessive order or the chaos of collective passion.