Educational Media Reviews Online

This video discusses 3 major ancient Greek dramas, and their powerful portrayal of women's roles in ancient Greek/Athenian society. The three plays discussed are: Medea by Euripides (480-416 B.C.); Antigone by Sophocles (496-406 B.C.), and Lysistrata by Aristophanes (448-380 B.C.). Academic experts in the areas of ancient Greek culture, society, and history are interviewed throughout the film, and provide interesting and provocative commentary on these three timeless dramas. All of the plays deal with the fear in male Greek democracy of women out of control and crossing gender boundaries within their society. For ancient Greek/Athenian males, the entire purpose of war was to protect the home, the women, and especially the children, who were the future of the society.

Medea is a women who murders her children because she knows that her husband Jason (the famous Argonaut who steals the Golden Fleece) loves them above all else, and she is distraught over all she has given up for him and his career, as he discards her in order to marry someone else. Antigone defies her ruler, in order to bury her brother and follow the dictates of the gods, rather than the laws of men. Lysistrata is a comedy of Greek women who go on a sex strike in order to stop their husbands from going to war.

This video is highly recommended. In 37 minutes, each of these famous ancient Greek plays is discussed, and their importance related by experts and academics. It is a good film for first-time readers and students of Greek drama to understand the importance of the issues that these plays relate, and that they are the first real dramas of Western society.