Golden Fleece

This is perfect, Mendez said.

He removed the cover and gave the script a new name, Argo, like the vessel used by Jason on his daring voyage across the world to retrieve the Golden Fleece.

The new production company outfitted its office with phone lines, typewriters, film posters and canisters, and a sign on the door.

Studio 6 Productions, named for the six Americans awaiting rescue.

So many things in one mythical figure.

The lovelorn witch who helped the hero Jason secure the Golden Fleece in the process, betraying her family and, along the way, murdering her brother.

The

giver of magical glow-ups, sometimes of fatal consequences.

Obviously, we'll then slow down and take it a bit more gradually.

But very, very nutshell-y.

This play starts sometime after Medea has helped Jason acquire the Golden Fleece, which was a quest that he had to undertake.

And we'll go into that next episode.

They're there to give you hints, I think, in some cases, like the mirrors.

That was kind of a hint from the Golden Fleece story.

I will say I did appreciate Jeremy Hartwood's uh journal and the voice performance there i thought was pretty good he was steadily getting you know worse it was

great i thought it was really fun yeah

in all the signs of the weather also he trained him skillfully in all the manly exercises in running and leaping and wrestling and throwing the spear till he grew swift-footed as a stag and supple sinewed as a wild cat and strong as a mountain bull but when the dark winter came and the north wind blew bitter cold through the snow-laden pines Chiron had other lessons for his guests as they sat before a great fire of logs and fir cones, fashioning bows and arrows, or shaping and carving cups and platters of beech wood.

Then he would tell him of the brave deeds of famous heroes, some of whom he himself had known and taught in their youth, of Jason, whom he had brought up in that cavern from a child, and how he built the good ship Argo with wood from that same forest, and sailed her from Locos far into unknown seas to find the golden fleece.

And another child, Asclepius, whose mother died at his birth, and how he was brought to him like a lost lamb in the arms of Hermes, the kind and merry shepherd god.

Chiron thought that the God's touch must have gifted that child with his own love for young and weakly creatures, for Asclepios would never go hunting, but delighted to find and care for baby beasts and birds that had strayed or got hurt.

and he answered with a show of mildness in these words behold i will deal according to your pleasure in all things but i am now stricken in years and you are in the flower of your youth therefore it is for you to undertake a certain task what else were mine hear now what it is since you seek to be head over all our kindred for the matter touches him most nearly who is chief of our house there was a prince of our blood athamas by name whose wife died and left him with two young children and in no long time he wedded another now the second bride proved a cruel step-dame and when sons were born to her she plotted death for phrixus the eldest born of the first wife that her own children might inherit the kingdom she caused all the seed sown in the land to be secretly poisoned when many that ate the corn sickened and died she brought her husband to believe that the gods had sent a pestilence on the people which must be stayed by some great sacrifice then did she bribe a wicked seer to declare that the wrath of the gods could be turned away by no other victim than the king's first-born son but when the boy phrixus was laid on the altar stone and the knife upraised to slay him the gods delivered him out of her hands in wondrous wise for a ram with curly fleeces of gold stood suddenly on the altar, and while all shrank back amazed, the boy threw himself upon its back, and it rose with him into the air.

Overland and sea it flew till it brought him to the country of the Cochians, in the unknown regions far northward.

And there, by divine bidding, he sacrificed it to Ares, god of the land, and hung its golden fleece on a tree of his sacred grove.

but that fleece of gold was the bane of the hapless youth not long after, for the king of the Cochians put him to death only to possess the marvellous thing.

Like Darren, what's an Argonaut? Something related to an astronaut.

So, I mean, not to give away the show, but I just looked up, like, what is an Argonaut? Apparently, an Argonaut originally means one of the heroes in Greek mythology who sailed aboard the Argo with Jason on his quest for the Golden Fleece.

Okay.

I don't know that story, so I don't even know.

So that's a great place to start, and it's just kind of by person.

So you read about the earliest heroes, kind of the start, but then you get into, like, here's the quest of the Golden Fleece.

So I'm reading about that right now.

So you kind of get, like, backgrounds of these stories, and then here's where you get into... uh heracles or hercules and um and then just different different people the fall of troy so it kind of either goes by story or by uh by greek god or or person and what's great you know there's a index in the back so if you ever come across a person you can just look them up and get the get the story pretty quickly i keep this one very close i have a shelf uh right behind me here that's just dedicated to kind of reference books and this book is on that shelf it is uh like eye level so i can just grab it at any time it's not like on a high shelf that i need a chair or a ladder for so i keep this one close sometimes if i'm reading a greek a work of greek that that has some greek mythology in it that i just need a reference tool i will just keep this right on my uh nightstand right behind my shoulder there uh that i'll keep this right on there just for for easy reference So that's the first one.

For almost 3,000 years, their story has captured the imagination.

More than 100 books have been published about the Argos' voyage and the sailors, the Argonauts, who ventured far away to bring home the Golden Fleece.

In addition, a dozen feature films and major TV adaptations have brought the story to life.

The NBC adaptation drew more than 20 million viewers a night.

In moments, we'll hear about Jason, the expedition leader in the Rams' golden fleece, hanging on a tree by the Black Sea, guarded by a sleepless, fiery-eyed dragon coiled around the trunk.

The fleece belongs to a king named Aeates.

He is the son of Helios, the sun god.

He left.