Oedipus Rex to video and TV. In 1967 Pier Paolo Pasolini directed "Edipo Re", a modern interpretation of the play. Toshio Matsumoto's 1969 film, "Funeral Parade of Roses", is a loose adaptation of the play and an important work of the Japanese New Wave. In Colombia, writer Gabriel García Márquez adapted the story in "Edipo Alcalde", bringing it to the real Colombian situation. Composer Igor Stravinsky wrote an opera/oratorio version of Oedipus rex (opera), premiered in 1927 by the Théâtre Sarah Bernhardt, Paris. It is scored for orchestra, speaker, soloists, and male chorus. The libretto, based on Sophocles's tragedy, was written by
Oedipus Rex the prophecy that the king had sought to avoid by exposing Oedipus at birth is fulfilled. Before arriving at Thebes, Oedipus encounters the Sphinx, a legendary beast with the head and breast of a woman, the body of a lioness, and the wings of an eagle. The Sphinx was sent to the road approaching Thebes as a punishment from the gods, and would strangle any traveler who failed to answer a certain riddle. The precise riddle asked by the Sphinx varied in early traditions, and is not stated in "Oedipus Rex", as the event precedes the play; but the most