On Friday, the Temple of Music and Art will run its final showing of a re-written version of "The Odyssey."

The script was adapted in 1992 by Nobel Prize-winning poet Derek Walcott and first performed in London by the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Local director Stuart Brousel came across the play while working on a thesis about myth reconstruction. He fell in love with the script and began showing it to friends. He was browbeaten into directing by his converts, several of whom are now performing in the Quicksilver production.

"I was first drawn to the language of the prose," Brousel said. "I was surprised at how modern it is. You have this great combination of modern language and modern thought and language that is really poetic and beautiful."

The play is meant to be ambiguous in both time and place. This way, Odysseus becomes any man in any war. The play's costumes range from classical Greek to baggy pants and wallet chains; the narrator is a blues singer.

"I find it funny that I'm directing a play that's so in tune with current events, probably more than any other running in Tucson right now," Brousel said, "and the play is more than 4,000 years old."

Susan Petrakis, an adjunct professor of classics, said that we can learn from, and be touched by, the very old story about a man trying to make it home.

"I'm intrigued by the idea of adapting plays," Petrakis said. "It's a wonderful idea to bring classics to life. It's always interesting to see something familiar from another perspective."

The plot follows a man who goes off to war and loses contact with his wife and son. He spends the next 20 years trying to get back to them. A subplot follows the life of the soldier's young son, who is left to piece together his father as he grows up.

The basic idea is a more complicated "Wizard of Oz." The play's theme is that you can go home again, or as Brousel put it, "You can get back to what you love."

This is the second, and final running of the play, which also ran last weekend.

"A lot of people seemed to really respond to the play," Brousel said. "Others seemed not to get it. It took about 20 minutes for everyone to get really engaged. One friend of mine who had been familiar with 'The Odyssey' said that she was surprised to find herself crying."

The play runs tonight at the Cabaret Theatre in the Temple of Music and Art, 330 S. Scott Ave. Tickets are $6 at the door. For more information, call the Temple at 884-4875.