Lysistrata and Spike Lee

This fall, I have a friend who is taking a humanities class. Her assignments, readings and reports have led to all kinds of discussions about classic literature. I have had the chance to talk about Shakespeare and the Latin classics again. Shockingly concepts and ideas I haven't used in my daily life in years. One of the works we talked about was Lysistrata. In case you're not familiar with Aristophanes work:

Lysistrata (/laɪˈsɪstrətə/ or /ˌlɪsəˈstrɑːtə/; Attic Greek: Λυσιστράτη, "Army Disbander") is a comedy by Aristophanes. Originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BCE, it is a comic account of one woman's extraordinary mission to end the Peloponnesian War. Lysistrata persuades the women of Greece to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace—a strategy, however, that inflames the battle between the sexes. The play is notable for being an early exposé of sexual relations in a male-dominated society. Wikipedia

It's a comedy in the bawdy nature. Many stagings have the male cast members with giant plastic phallic members in the latter parts of the play. Imagine a sex comedy with visuals by 14 year olds. But in it's bawdy nature, which as a rule plays to our lowest common denominator - it questions our wants and desires. Aristophanes makes fun of one desire, sex, and man's determination for it by highlighting another desire in a comedic way. It was satire. I'm sure that not everyone in the audience appreciated it. But it was clever in its way.

But it is a classic and historic example of the constant and continuing conflict between men and women and sex. What is it, what should it be, why do we do what we do in relation to it? In one way it shows the power of the gender conflict, in another it shows the mental and social limitations of the time: the idea that the only way to stop men from fighting is to take away their sex, or that women can only influence situation/life through their sexual control. Lysistrata has in it elements of both feminism and sexism. One aspect unexpected from a play written in 411 BCE and one expected.

Yet. It is easy to debate how far we have come as a species in roughly 2,425 years. Even as I read Lysistrata again this fall. (I'll admit that I didn't see the bigger picture or the grander issues of sexism, feminism and just plain humanity when I read it as a younger man). I found myself wondering if in our time with different horrible challenges of war and hate, some group might not pick up Lysistrata's banner of chastity. What would happen? How would society react?

As ever, mine was not an original thought. I was to delighted and intrigued to find that Spike Lee was developing an update of Lysistrata himself, titled Chi-Raq. The story, as explained by fourth wall breaking narrator, Dolmedes (Samuel L. Jackson):

The Aristophanes comedy "Lysistrata," about a sex strike waged by Athenian women designed to frustrate their lunkhead warriors into halting the Peloponnesian War, dates to 411 B.C. and was written in rhymed verse. "Chi-Raq" will do likewise, he says. (At times the movie feels like a nervy grad-school collaboration between theater and film departments, with access to really good actors.) The South Side women are fed up with the carnage caused by the war between rival gangs, the Trojans (Wesley Snipes is their one-eyed leader, Cyclops) and the Spartans (Cannon's character, a rising rapper with a gangbanger's resume, goes by the name Chi-Raq). Lysistrata gets wind of a sex strike, a nonfictional example from recent history, led by Liberian activist Leymah Gbowee. Why not try it here, in the bloody city by the lake? - Chicago Tribune

I appreciate the change of Lysistrata from wife to warrior. The setting of Chicago certainly makes the modern audience take more notice than ancient Greece.  In keeping the comedic tone, Lee attempts to sneak past the defenses of the audience and make an impact. Humor is the gateway to all emotions. If I can make you laugh, I can make you cry, I can make you feel. It is the great irony of both linguistics and Shakespeare that his comedies end in tears and his tragedies end in hope.

I look forward to seeing Lee's interpretation of Aristophanes work. No doubt there will be those who call out it as another sequel or icon for the lack of originality in modern media. But this is not another white guy with a gun saving a building full of people. It is not Channing Tatum lampooning Johnny Depp in high school. It's not a comic or a space opera or another dramatic retelling of war.

Chi-Raq like Lysistrata asks a question. Hopefully it reminds us to ask it as well:

Is humanity's primal need to create able overcome it's primal need to destroy?