The National Theatre of Greece on tour with two major productions of ancient drama, "Lysistrata" by Aristophanes and "Orestes" by Euripides.
28.6.2010
Lysistrata by Aristophanes
Twenty years after the beginning of the Peloponnesian War, the social and financial situation in Athens has become so difficult that Lysistrata, a woman, decides to undertake action! Her plan is to force men to negotiate peach through the denial of their conjugal rights. So, she organises a secret meeting of women from Athens and the other warring cities and convinces them to refuse all sexual contact with their husbands and lovers. Total chaos follows, and peace is enthroned in the end.
When Lysistrata was first performed in 411 BC, Athens was going through its worst crisis since the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War. A group of oligarchs took advantage of the tense external situation, which had worsened after the military defeat of the Athenians in Sicily, and seized power in Athens.
In Yannis Kakleass production, Lysistrata, the most popular of Aristophanes comedic heroines, deals with the issue of war by combining political awareness with sex and satire.
In the performance, female parts are played by male actors. Not as parody of femininity, or an ironic imitation of female mechanisms as men imagine them, but as an invocation of the female element that has the force to change the terms of the game.
Women are not only the other sex; they are not just the opposite pole of male. It is the energy of love that creates the oppositions, without abolishing them. The conspiracy of women in order to stop the war is a revolution of life against the absurdity and the death.
First performances: 16-17/07/2010 Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus
Last performance: 05/09/2010
Translation: K.C. Myris
Direction: Yannis Kakleas
Set design: Manolis Pantelidakis
Costume design: Eleni Manolopoulou
Music: Stavros Gasparatos
Choreography: Kyriakos Kosmidis
Lighting: Sakis Birbilis
Music coach: Melina Peonidou
Projections videos: Pindaros Andriopoulos
Assistant director: Frosso Lytra
Cast:
Lysistrata Vassilis Haralambopoulos
Cleonice Yorgos Chrysostomou
Myrrhine, Cinesias Makis Papadimitriou
Lampito Laertis Malkotsis
Magistrate Christos Hatzipanayotis
Athenian Negotiator Themis Panou
Spartan Herald Stavros Mavridis
Myrrhine Eleni Kokkidou
Mens Chorus: Vangelis Hatzinikolaou, Nikos Kardonis, Christos Malakis, Konstantinos Maravelias, Giorgos Papageorgiou, Dimitris Passas, Grigoris Pimenidis, Alain Rivero, Michalis Theophanous, Konstantinos Tserkakis
Womens Chorus: Alexandra Aidini, Ifigenia Asteriadi, Anna Athanasiadi, Faye Kokkinopoulou, Niki Lami, Katerina Lypiridou, Sofia Michail, Agoritsa Oikonomou, Marianthi Sontaki, Ioanna Triantafyllidou, Angeliki Trombouki, Maria Tsima
Orestes by Euripides
Αfter murdering his mother, Clytemnestra, Orestes languishes in bed, tormented by the Furies, with his sister Electra by his side. When their uncle, Menelaus, returns to Argos from Troy, accompanied by Helen, they hope that he will intervene and persuade the city to overturn the death sentence. However, neither Menelaus nor Tyndareus (Clytemnestras father) wish to help him. Trapped by their own actions, they consort to desperate violence in order to save themselves. The solution is ultimately provided by the intervention of Apollo, who assumes the role of deus ex machine.
Euripides Orestes is a play inextricably linked with its era (it was first performed in 408 BC) and provides a timely comment on Athenian democracy. At the same time, it is the last of Euripides plays to have been performed in Athens before he left the city for Macedonia. In Orestes, Euripides deals with the fate of the murderer after the crime, a theme also examined in Aeschylus Eumenides, but Euripides gives the theme a more human scale. It is a play of conflict, reversals of fortune and with a strong political dimension.
In his fourth production at Epidaurus, and his first as artistic director of the National Theatre of Greece, Yannis Houvardas is working with an impressive cast of actors. In the National Theatres performance, Orestes, Electra and the other characters of the mythical saga, are seen as fable entities trapped in time and space in the ancient theatre. Like Tantalus they carry the weight of the family history, the weight of a tragedy without purgation. Opposite the characters stands a Chorus of contemporary young men and women. The performance raises questions about relations between the generations and the sexes, about social cohesion and about the survival of young people in a world defined by factors beyond their control. The end of the masterly ironic Euripidean play brings the young group face to face with the importance of History and Myth in their own life.
First performances: 30-31/07/2010 Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus
Last performances: 24-25-26/09/2010 Teatro Olimpico, Vicenza (The National Theatre is invited by the Teatro Stabile di Veneto to open the 63rd Cycle of Classical Performances at the historical theatre Olimpico in Vicenza, Italy).
Translation: Stratis Paschalis
Direction: Yannis Houvardas
Set and costume design: Johannes Schütz
Lighting: Lefteris Pavlopoulos
Cast:
Orestes Nikos Kouris
Electra Stefania Goulioti
Menelaus Akyllas Karazisis
Phrygian Nikos Karathanos
Helen Tania Tripi
Hermione Georgianna Dalara
Tyndareus Christos Stergioglou
Messenger Manolis Mavromatakis
Pylades Kostas Vassardanis
Apollo Yorgos Glastras
Chorus: Polyxeni Aklidi, Lambrini Angelidou, Iro Bezou, Iro Chioti, Konstantinos Gavalas, Anna Kalaitzidou, Kora Karvouni, Yannis Klinis, Zoe Kyriakidou, Rinio Kyriazi, Lena Papaligoura, Virginia Tamparopoulou, Thanos Tokakis, Yorgos Tzavaras, Eleni Vergeti
Twenty years after the beginning of the Peloponnesian War, the social and financial situation in Athens has become so difficult that Lysistrata, a woman, decides to undertake action! Her plan is to force men to negotiate peach through the denial of their conjugal rights. So, she organises a secret meeting of women from Athens and the other warring cities and convinces them to refuse all sexual contact with their husbands and lovers. Total chaos follows, and peace is enthroned in the end.
When Lysistrata was first performed in 411 BC, Athens was going through its worst crisis since the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War. A group of oligarchs took advantage of the tense external situation, which had worsened after the military defeat of the Athenians in Sicily, and seized power in Athens.
In Yannis Kakleass production, Lysistrata, the most popular of Aristophanes comedic heroines, deals with the issue of war by combining political awareness with sex and satire.
In the performance, female parts are played by male actors. Not as parody of femininity, or an ironic imitation of female mechanisms as men imagine them, but as an invocation of the female element that has the force to change the terms of the game.
Women are not only the other sex; they are not just the opposite pole of male. It is the energy of love that creates the oppositions, without abolishing them. The conspiracy of women in order to stop the war is a revolution of life against the absurdity and the death.
First performances: 16-17/07/2010 Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus
Last performance: 05/09/2010
Translation: K.C. Myris
Direction: Yannis Kakleas
Set design: Manolis Pantelidakis
Costume design: Eleni Manolopoulou
Music: Stavros Gasparatos
Choreography: Kyriakos Kosmidis
Lighting: Sakis Birbilis
Music coach: Melina Peonidou
Projections videos: Pindaros Andriopoulos
Assistant director: Frosso Lytra
Cast:
Lysistrata Vassilis Haralambopoulos
Cleonice Yorgos Chrysostomou
Myrrhine, Cinesias Makis Papadimitriou
Lampito Laertis Malkotsis
Magistrate Christos Hatzipanayotis
Athenian Negotiator Themis Panou
Spartan Herald Stavros Mavridis
Myrrhine Eleni Kokkidou
Mens Chorus: Vangelis Hatzinikolaou, Nikos Kardonis, Christos Malakis, Konstantinos Maravelias, Giorgos Papageorgiou, Dimitris Passas, Grigoris Pimenidis, Alain Rivero, Michalis Theophanous, Konstantinos Tserkakis
Womens Chorus: Alexandra Aidini, Ifigenia Asteriadi, Anna Athanasiadi, Faye Kokkinopoulou, Niki Lami, Katerina Lypiridou, Sofia Michail, Agoritsa Oikonomou, Marianthi Sontaki, Ioanna Triantafyllidou, Angeliki Trombouki, Maria Tsima
Orestes by Euripides
Αfter murdering his mother, Clytemnestra, Orestes languishes in bed, tormented by the Furies, with his sister Electra by his side. When their uncle, Menelaus, returns to Argos from Troy, accompanied by Helen, they hope that he will intervene and persuade the city to overturn the death sentence. However, neither Menelaus nor Tyndareus (Clytemnestras father) wish to help him. Trapped by their own actions, they consort to desperate violence in order to save themselves. The solution is ultimately provided by the intervention of Apollo, who assumes the role of deus ex machine.
Euripides Orestes is a play inextricably linked with its era (it was first performed in 408 BC) and provides a timely comment on Athenian democracy. At the same time, it is the last of Euripides plays to have been performed in Athens before he left the city for Macedonia. In Orestes, Euripides deals with the fate of the murderer after the crime, a theme also examined in Aeschylus Eumenides, but Euripides gives the theme a more human scale. It is a play of conflict, reversals of fortune and with a strong political dimension.
In his fourth production at Epidaurus, and his first as artistic director of the National Theatre of Greece, Yannis Houvardas is working with an impressive cast of actors. In the National Theatres performance, Orestes, Electra and the other characters of the mythical saga, are seen as fable entities trapped in time and space in the ancient theatre. Like Tantalus they carry the weight of the family history, the weight of a tragedy without purgation. Opposite the characters stands a Chorus of contemporary young men and women. The performance raises questions about relations between the generations and the sexes, about social cohesion and about the survival of young people in a world defined by factors beyond their control. The end of the masterly ironic Euripidean play brings the young group face to face with the importance of History and Myth in their own life.
First performances: 30-31/07/2010 Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus
Last performances: 24-25-26/09/2010 Teatro Olimpico, Vicenza (The National Theatre is invited by the Teatro Stabile di Veneto to open the 63rd Cycle of Classical Performances at the historical theatre Olimpico in Vicenza, Italy).
Translation: Stratis Paschalis
Direction: Yannis Houvardas
Set and costume design: Johannes Schütz
Lighting: Lefteris Pavlopoulos
Cast:
Orestes Nikos Kouris
Electra Stefania Goulioti
Menelaus Akyllas Karazisis
Phrygian Nikos Karathanos
Helen Tania Tripi
Hermione Georgianna Dalara
Tyndareus Christos Stergioglou
Messenger Manolis Mavromatakis
Pylades Kostas Vassardanis
Apollo Yorgos Glastras
Chorus: Polyxeni Aklidi, Lambrini Angelidou, Iro Bezou, Iro Chioti, Konstantinos Gavalas, Anna Kalaitzidou, Kora Karvouni, Yannis Klinis, Zoe Kyriakidou, Rinio Kyriazi, Lena Papaligoura, Virginia Tamparopoulou, Thanos Tokakis, Yorgos Tzavaras, Eleni Vergeti
Latest updated: 18/01/2005
