Lysioidia: Transgendered Actresses/Actors in Hellenistic Theater

Abstract

Late in Athenaeus’ encyclopedic symposium, discussion turns to dinner entertainment, especially several obscure, defunct song genres whose distinctive features are shared around the table (14.620-621). While hilaroidia, serious paratragedy, and magoidia, suggestive, emasculated paracomedy, are directly contrasted with regards to costuming, accompaniment, and actor characterization, lysioidia is left in limbo here, either identical to magoidia (Aristocles) or identical in musical repertoire and everything else except, the lysiode performs gunaikeia prosopa andreiois, “female characters as males,” or “in male attire (Aristoxenus; Eust. Od. 23.134).” The dramatic effect even required a specialized woodwind instrument and musician (Ath. 5.182c; 6.252e). Three performers of lysioidia are identified in extant texts: Metrobios, a lover and “principal advisor” of Sulla (Plu. Sul. 36); Antiodemis, a “lovely chick,” “halcyon of Lysis-song,” and “plaything of drunken abandon,” admired by Antipater of Sidon (AP 9.567); and another female lysiode loved by Diogenes of Babylon (Ath. 5.211c-d Olson). So, women or men could sing these songs that deliberately blurred gender boundaries, certainly in costuming, and likely in lyrics and vocal register. Performers were to be young and alluring (Metrobios was past his prime), presumably type cast for gender ambiguity. The vocal timbre was countertenor/contralto, producing a sound and effect much like Julie Andrews’ androgyny in Victor/Victoria (1995) or Marlene Dietrich’s tuxedo-clad, bisexually charged love song as a cabaret performer in Morocco (1930; Naremore 1988, Loyo 1996), performances which I will examine with video here, along with the operatic ‘trouser’ role (Andre 2006) and the work of Elizabethan/Restoration female-role specialist, Edward Kynaston, portrayed in Stage Beauty (2004). Lysiode roles and plots sometimes centered on comic adulteresses, pimps, and drunks, though not necessarily in slapstick fashion. Illusion and delusion were key, and ribaldry might be expected. Antiodemis, object of the male gaze (cf. McClure 2003), offers a mesmerizing gaze of her own, erotic tones with fluid, sensuous movement, and gentle charm that Antipater recommends to pacify belligerent Romans. In a lampooning by the Seleucid Alexander Balas, Diogenes’ lover appears before the unsuspecting philosopher wearing a costume intended for him; the performance subtext suggests that Diogenes was admiring ‘himself’ onstage played by his male-impersonator girlfriend (Braund 2000). Many theater historians (following Reich 1903) have lumped lysiodes and similar singers under a generic heading of mime. While their actions and some roles are mimetic, the distinctive costuming and performance conceit do not reflect the well-represented genre of mime (Leppin 1992). The attested lysiodes are dated 150-80 BCE when Romans were rapidly adopting and adapting Hellenistic entertainments; thus, the heyday of lysioidia and its disappearance coincide chronologically and programmatically with early pantomime, the most popular theatrical genre in imperial Rome - a popularity partially founded on a performer’s ability to transgender believably (cf. Drechsler 2006). Selected Bibliography: Andre, N. 2006. Voicing Gender: Castrati, Travesti and the Second Woman in Early-Nineteenth-Century Italian Opera. Bloomington IN. Braund, D. 2000 “Athenaeus on The Kings of Syria,” in D. Braund/J. Wilkins. Athenaeus and His World, 514-22. Exeter. Drechsler, C. 2006. “‘Transgendered’ Perspectives as a Challenge to Sex, Gender, and Sexuality,” in W.Schissel. Home/Bodies: Geographies of Self, Place and Space, 47-66. Calgary. Fujita, M. & M. Shapiro. 2006. Transvestism and the Onnagata Traditions in Shakespeare and Kabuki. Folkestone UK. Leppin, H. 1992. Histrionen: Untersuchungen zur sozialen Stellung von Buhnenkunstlern im Westen des romischen Reiches zur Zeit der Republik und des Principats. Bonn. Loyo, H. 1996. “Dietrich’s Androgyny and Gendered Spectatorship,” in C. Cornut-Gentille d’Arcy/J.A. Garcia Landa. Gender, I-deology: Essays on Theory, Fiction and Film, 317-32. Atlanta. McClure, L. 2003. Courtesans at Table: Gender and Greek Literary Culture in Athenaeus. New York. Naremore, J. 1988. Acting in the Cinema. Berkeley. Olson, S.D, tr., comm. 2006-. Athenaeus. The Learned Banqueters (Loeb). Cambridge MA. Phillips, J. 2006. Transgender on Screen. New York. Reich, H. 1903. Der Mimus: Ein litterar-entwickelungsgeschichtlicher Versuch. Berlin Rowe, D. 1995. “Desiring Berlin: Gender and Modernity in Weimar Germany,” in M. Meskimmon/S. West. Visions of the ‘Neue Frau’: Women and the Visual Arts in Weimar Germany, 143-64. Brookfield VT.