The moment I walked into the Black Box Studio, an eerie feeling immediately overcame me. This feeling was caused by production staging, the set itself, and the music. I felt that the most interesting staging aspect was that many of the characters were already staged and on set as the audience was arriving. There were prison guards walking back and forth and a bunch of women who were dressed in tattered clothes and obviously distressed. As soon as I sat down, I found myself extremely quiet and I noticed that I could not take my eyes off these women. I was so intrigued by the way they were acting, and I wanted to know why they seemed so upset and sad.
The setting and props also added to my first impression. The set was designed to look like a prison camp and it was obvious that some sort of place or city had been destroyed. There were huge platforms of concrete spread around the set and in the background there was a destroyed, modern building. The music playing as we walked in was very low key, not very loud, and provoked a creepy vibe in the audience. The set gave me a clear idea that something bad had happened. The music really made the set more lifelike. If there was no music playing as we walked in, I feel like it would have been awkward to be in the theater with the characters already staged. The music definitely completed my first impression of the play. Overall, I was given a clear idea of what might have happened and that the characters were in trouble and scared.
By having the characters previously staged with music already setting the mood, the experience I had coming into the theater felt so much more real. I felt like I was being drawn into the middle of the set and I noticed that the rest of the audience seemed to be pulled into the experience. I also noticed that the seating was extremely close to the actors and actresses. I really liked this aspect because I felt like I was a part of every scene. The attire of the actors really matched their roles. The Trojan women, respectively, were dressed in ragged clothes and had visible physical wounds to symbolize their struggle with Troy. The guards were armed and dressed in all black. I felt like the costumes helped the audience distinguish class as well as where the characters were from. It made us believe that the characters really were from Troy or Greece.
I think that the play was about the women of Troy’s struggle to stay faithful to their beloved city, remember their families that were lost, and keep faith and hope. There were various instances in the play where you could see that the women were becoming frustrated with the gods, whom they had done everything for, and expected help and salvation in return. For example, it is seen in the scene where the Trojan women discover the Greeks want to kill Astyanax. You