Kommos (theatre) having blinded himself in Sophocles' "Oedipus Rex" (c.429 BCE), and the exchange between Orestes, Electra and the chorus immediately after Clytemnestra's murder in Euripides' "Electra" (c.410 BCE). Kommos (theatre) A kommos (from Greek κομμός, "kommós", literally "striking", especially "beating of the head and breast in mourning") is a lyrical song of lamentation in an Athenian tragedy that the chorus and a dramatic character sing together. A kommos occurs "when the tension of the play rises to a climax of grief or horror or joy". Examples include the final section (lines 908-1077) of Aeschylus' "The Persians" (472 BCE) in which Xerxes
Oedipus Rex is based on; he refers to the play as a “further modification of the legend”, one that originates in a “misconceived secondary revision of the material, which has sought to exploit it for theological purposes.” The play has been filmed several times, twice in English. The 1957 film version, directed by Tyrone Guthrie, starred Douglas Campbell as Oedipus and had the cast performing the entire play in masks, as in ancient Greek theatre. The second English language film version, directed by Philip Saville and released in 1968, was filmed in Greece. This one showed the actors' faces and boasted an