On 31 July and 1 August, at the Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus, the National Theatre of Greece presents Euripides’ The Trojan Women, in a translation by Yannis Tsarouchis, adapted and directed by Eleni Efthymiou. In her directorial debut at Epidaurus, Efthymiou brings this profoundly human play to life in its most lyrical and communal dimension.

Twenty-two performers of different ages, with and without disabilities – including three on-stage musicians and actors from the En Dynamei Ensemble – foreground the musicality of the play through different bodies, voices, and experiences. 

This inclusive production is poetic and deeply political. The 31 July performance will also mark the first time in the history of Epidaurus that the theatre has been made accessible to people with sensory (visual and hearing) impairments. It is a distinctive reading of the play about the horror and absurdity of war, seen through the prism of the female body, which asserts its autonomy even under occupation.

In Efthymiou’s Trojan Women, it is not only the beautiful, healthy, and privileged women of Priam’s family who await their destiny. It is also the girls, and the elderly and disabled women, who even before the sack of the city were denied the right to make their own decisions and were rarely allowed to tell their own stories. Captured after the fall of Troy, the women must also face their own responsibility, as the silent acceptance of war reveals its devastating consequences. It is now clear that neither the gods, nor myth, nor fate determine their lives. Despite their pain and despair in the face of disaster, the Trojan women endure their loss without surrendering. Words become their weapons of resistance – even at the very end – against the slavery and loss of identity that the new reality has in store for them. They stand tall and find their voices, their grief transformed into a fragile but tenacious form of rebellion, with their mutual support now their greatest strength. 

Will the oppressed women of the world reclaim their right to self-determination? To scream their anger and hate, to laugh and lament amidst the chaos and the anguish? Will the women of Troy ever regain their physical autonomy?