Black Orpheus janitor takes him down a large darkened spiral staircase – a reference to the mythical Orpheus' descent into the underworld – to a Macumba ritual, a regional form of the Afro-Brazilian religion Candomblé. At the gate, there is a dog named Cerberus, after the three-headed dog of Hades in Greek mythology. During the ritual, the janitor tells Orfeu to call to his beloved by singing. The spirit of Eurydice inhabits the body of an old woman and speaks to him. Orfeu wants to gaze upon her, but Eurydice begs him not to lest he lose her forever. When he turns
Orpheus Descending (film) Orpheus Descending (film) Orpheus Descending is a 1990 American television film starring Vanessa Redgrave and directed by Peter Hall. It is an adaptation of Tennessee Williams' play of the same name. Hall had directed Redgrave in an acclaimed Broadway production of the play a year earlier. The stage actors such as Redgrave, Kevin Anderson and Brad Sullivan reprised their roles for the film. Lady Torrance (Redgrave) is introduced as a disillusioned character; her Sicilian father was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan and she's been trapped in a miserable marriage for twenty years. Her tyrannical and bigoted husband is struck