Perhaps no one interpreted the human cost of war and suffering better than the Greeks.

Today, we tote up the price in fleeting images on television every day. Horrible as that is, it seems distant and not nearly so powerful as watching Euripides’ Hecuba, all those centuries ago, which deals with war’s consequences: murder, greed, the indignity of slavery and revenge.

Hecuba (translated by UCSD professor Dr. Marianne McDonald) is now on the boards at Sixth@Penn Theatre in Hillcrest, in a stunning production directed by Esther Emery.

Trojan Queen Hecuba (Robin Christ) has known too much sorrow already – when we meet her, she has lost 17 of her 19 children (or 48 of 50, depending on whom you read). Only daughter Polyxena (Amy Zeidel) and son Polydorus remain.

Or so she thinks. As the play opens, a white-clad specter unwinds himself slowly, yoga-style, from a pile of white cloth on the stage. It is the ghost of Polydorus (Bhutoh dancer Charlene Penner, bald and white faced), who will watch over the proceedings, now from a tree, interacting with characters unaware of his presence.

The audience knows what Hecuba will later learn – that her youngest son, sent to Thrace for safekeeping from the Trojan War, has been murdered by his host, King Polymestor (Jesse MacKinnon), for the gold he brought with him.

But first Hecuba, captive to the victorious Greeks, must deal with the unspeakable – the imminent sacrifice of Polyxena to the memory of Greek hero Achilles. Beside herself with grief, Hecuba begs Odysseus (David Cohen) to relent, but he does not. Polyxena bravely tries to comfort her mother by declaring death preferable to life as a slave, and submits to her fate nobly.

But her mother does not – how can any mother accept the willful killing of her child? As indignity piles upon loss, layers of royal graciousness and carefully taught civility are painfully peeled back until finally Hecuba is a raw human psyche that wants only revenge. “There is strength in numbers and women know how to plot,” she says as she plans her hideous revenge on Polymestor.

Hecuba gets her revenge, but leaves the audience with eternal questions: Who has won? How can one brutality be considered payment for another? When have we had enough killing?

Emery has assembled an exceptional cast headed by Christ’s phenomenal performance as the queen pushed beyond slavery and degradation into that dark primal space not many of us want to go.

MacKinnon’s Polymestor is a wonder of deceit. With the bearing of a modern politician, he too has reasons for his action. If you don’t listen too carefully, they almost sound rational.

Beidel’s Polyxena, Walter Ritter’s Agamemnon and Edward Eigner’s Talthybius and the chorus (Jen Meyer, Erin McKown and Jolene Hui) add weight and depth to the talented cast.

Hecuba is a brutal but an important and timely play, reminding us of the effects of too much suffering and violence. Mahatma Gandhi said it best: “If the world keeps on taking an eye for an eye, soon everyone will be blind.”

Hecuba plays through Dec. 19 at Sixth@Penn Theatre in Hillcrest. Shows Wed.-Sat. at 8:00 p.m., Sun. matinee at 2:00 p.m. For tickets: call (619) 688-9210, or visit www.gaylesbiantimes.com for a link to their website.

Ah, men. Ah, women. Ah, love.

Jason Robert Brown’s The Last 5 Years is a musical – an opera, really – the history of a five-year marriage, told in parallel but opposite directions by Jamie Wellerstein (Jeremiah Lorenz) and Cathy Hiatt (Erin Cronican). Jamie tells the story from the beginning; Cathy works back from the end of the relationship.

The story is told in song – there is no dialogue at all – but don’t let that scare you. The songs by Brown, the young songwriting phenom who also wrote Parade and Songs for a New World, are clever of lyric and easy on the ear; rather Sondheimian, in fact, without Sondheim’s penchant for trickiness and complexity.

Jamie is a wunderkind writer, who at 23 gets a major novel published (“I got a singular impression things are moving too fast.”). He’s dated gobs of women, but not until he meets his “Shiksa Goddess” does he fall in love.

Cathy is a struggling young actress who does summer stock in Ohio (“A Summer in Ohio”), hating every minute of it, and when that’s over gets even more depressed by the audition scene in New York.

What happens is what often happens in this situation – Jamie’s success heightens Cathy’s failure, she starts to accuse him of self-involvement, he tries to tell her she’s better than she thinks she is, communication starts to break down and eventually, alienation sets in.

But the story is told in wonderful, easy-to-identify-with songs that really are sung dialogue (or sung stream-of-consciousness). Example: the newly-smitten Jamie’s meditation on his shiksa goddess, after all those years of dating nice Jewish girls: “If you have a powerful connection to your firearm collection, I say drop and shoot: I’m your Hebrew slave.”) We’ve all been there, lived through the progression from that heady romantic haze through the nuts-and-bolts of trying to relate to what is, after all, a total stranger, and finally to the realization by at least one party that it won’t work out.

Lorenz and Cronican are an enormously attractive pair with voices and acting ability to carry this off. Lorenz, in particular, has a solid voice with an extremely pleasant falsetto in the upper range. Cronican’s voice is clear and listenable; her opening song, “Still Hurting,” is especially lovely and poignant. Kudos also go to behind-the-scrim musicians Amy Dalton, Beth Mosko, Rik Ogden and Diana Elledge.

This is a great play for financially strapped regional companies to produce. It requires only two actors and one minimalist set – set designer Marty Burnett had it easy this time. There are movable pieces usable as furniture and a gray speckled backdrop that turns blue with lighting. That’s it.

Ah, love. The dreams, the hopes, the expectations, followed all too often by the disappointments and the pain. Why do we keep doing it? Because that’s what people do, and because sometimes it actually works out. And as for The Last 5 Years, you’ll laugh, you’ll cry. You may also cringe with recognition, but you’ll enjoy this show.

The Last 5 Years runs through Jan. 2 at North Coast Repertory Theatre in Solana Beach. Shows Wed., Thurs. and Sat. at 8:00 p.m.; Sun. at 7:00 p.m.; matinees Sat. and Sun. at 2:00 p.m. Ask about the special New Year’s Eve show. For tickets call (858) 481-1055 or visit www.gaylesbiantimes.com for a link to their website.