Drawn from Homer’s Iliad, Thersites, a soldier from the Trojan war, travels a haunted ancient world to confront the rise of tyrants — past and present.

The film was completed before the November 2020 U.S. election and released on the Laemmle Cinema streaming service two days after the January 6th insurrection. Absent Now the Dead was presented at the Rhetoric Society of America Conference in June 2022, with papers given regarding its poetry and anti-authoritarian theme.