Since first written down in the late 8th or early 7th century BCE, Homer’s Odyssey has become an enduring part of the literary canon—not just in its myriad translations but in many adaptations and derivative works across every creative medium. While many have focused on the titular hero Odysseus (or his various analogues from Sinbad the Sailor to Leopold Bloom and Ulysses Everett McGill), Homer’s epic also offers other characters who’ve captured our imaginations. This is the premise of composer and lyricist Alex Bechtel’s Penelope. Bechtel, with collaborators Grace McLean and director Eva Steinmetz, wrote the book for the play now in production at Signature Theatre, that retells the story from the perspective of Odysseus’ wife, the queen of Ithaca.
Bechtel and his collaborators are not the first—and likely won’t be the last—to expand upon the story of Penelope (Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad is a famous example). The Odyssey may be named for her husband, but Homer sketched out a fascinating character in the queen. Though hemmed in by the patriarchy, many of the epithets Homer applied to his hero, from “wily” to “cunning” to “man of twists and turns,” also fit Penelope. They appreciate one another in a way no other couple does in Greek mythology. Even when Odysseus finds himself in the company of island goddesses, first Circe and then Calypso, neither compare to Penelope; and despite the many mercenary suitors who have set themselves up in her palace trying to persuade her to remarry, she would rather wait for Odysseus’ return. But Penelope proves capable of ruling Ithaca for 20 years in her king’s absence, as well as a cunning strategist who has kept boorish suitors at bay and protected her son, Telemachus, from harm. There’s plenty to work with.
Penelope opens with the sound of ocean waves and a breath. When the lights go up on Penelope (Jessica Phillips, taking over for co-writer McLean, who originated the role during its 2022 premiere at the Rockwood Music Hall in New York), she is seated at an upright piano and, after a sigh, starts to play a few chords. “It is morning now,” she says. Her outfit of lime green and ocean blue satin (designed by Danielle Preston) shimmers in the light of dawn. The stage is shared by chairs, music stands, and a drum kit. From dawn to dusk the colors shift over wave crests and mountain slopes—a wonderful effect from lighting designer Jesse Belsky creates upon the relief sculpted by scenic designer Paige Hathaway.
One by one, the musicians take their places on the stage starting with cellist Susanna Mendlow, bowing a bass melody and arpeggios, followed by viola player Imelda Tecson Juarez. Penelope surrenders the piano stool to music director Ben Moss, who begins to play short melodic phrases. Finally they’re joined by violinist Jennifer Rickard and percussionist Erika Johnson. Penelope makes her way toward the front of the stage as the band play the overture.
Bechtel and his collaborators have set this telling as a cabaret in what appear to be the final days of Odysseus’ absence. Through song and storytelling, Penelope fills in the backstory for those who need a refresher in Greek mythology, recounting the causes of the Trojan War—her cousin Helen absconding to the Dardanelles—with an anachronistic whiskey in hand for the song “Drunk Iliad.”
The show’s compositions range from poems set to chamber music, to blues, soul, and pop ballads, but just as often they blur genre boundaries. The ensemble is up to any challenge the score presents, including the moment where, with the help of a change of lighting, and some clever sound design by Eric Norris, who adds the the hooting of Athena’s owl, they become a bawdy chorus manifesting as Odysseus’ patron goddess.
In performance, Phillips is a skilled storyteller, which she demonstrates as she monologues about the famous bargain Penelope made with her suitors: She will decide who to marry once she finishes weaving her tapestry—her fingers illustrate this work with a precise mime as she narrates all the images she renders in thread by day only to secretly unravel at night. Likewise, Phillips is effective as Penelope fantasizing about leaving the palace and having a one-night stand with a traveler, or even taking a ship and leaving Ithaca for good. Whereas Homer showed character through speech and action, Bechtel gives these characters the interiority of imagination.
However, if there is one failing with Penelope it is that Bechtel and company do not grant the queen of Ithaca the final victory that Homer wrote: Upon his return, Odysseus, his son, and two loyal servants slay the suitors, but before Penelope would accept him as her 20-year absent husband, he had to prove himself to not be an imposter and match her in wits. In Penelope, instead, we are given a more sentimental and romantic reunion, which, though beautifully performed by Phillips, nonetheless shortchanges Homer’s queen of some of her agency and intelligence that allowed her to outwit the patriarchy of ancient Ithaca.
Penelope, music and lyrics by Alex Bechtel, directed by Eva Steinmetz, book by Bechtel, Grace McLean, and Steinmetz, runs through April 21 at Signature Theatre. sigtheatre.org. $40–$99.