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‘Much is monstrous, yet nothing / more monstrous than man,’ reads a passage in Sophocles’ Antigone. It is a sentiment that was echoed in the opening speech of the 2020 Wiener Festwochen, held online by Brazilian actor and indigenous activist Kay Sara. Three pandemic years later, Kay Sara herself is finally on the Burgtheater stage as a protagonist. In keeping with Antigone’s revolt against Creon’s tyranny of injustice, she rises to a full-scale indictment in this tragedy rewrite by Milo Rau. In Brazil, where around 10 per cent of the population owns 80 per cent of the land, the Landless Workers’ Movement (MST) campaigns for radical land reform. As a chorus of the landless, they look down and comment on the events unfolding onstage between Creon, Antigone, her betrothed, Haemon, and his mother, Eurydice, from the huge video screen. In the final part of his Trilogy of Ancient Myths, which began with Orestes in Mosul (at the Wiener Festwochen in 2019), Milo Rau retells the story of right and wrong as a bloody clash between traditional wisdom and global turbo-capitalism.
Concept, Direction Milo Rau Text Milo Rau & Ensemble With Arne De Tremerie, Frederico Araujo, Kay Sara, Sara De Bosschere Music Elisabeth de Loore, Pablo Casella Collaboration Dramaturgy Giacomo Bisordi, Douglas Estevam, Martha Kiss Perrone With music by Elia Rediger Light design Dennis Diels Set Anton Lukas Video design Moritz von Dungern Costumes Anton Lukas, An De Mol Direction assistance Katelijne Laevens Production management Klaas Lievens Technical direction Oliver Houttekiet Stage management Marijn Vlaeminck Direction internship Chara Kasaraki
Production NTGent, International Institute of Political Murder (IIPM) Coproduction Wiener Festwochen, Romaeuropa Festival (Rome), Manchester International Festival, La Vilette (Paris), TANDEM Scène nationale (Arras-Douai), Künstlerhaus Mousonturm (Frankfurt a. M.), Equinoxe Scène Nationale Châteauroux In collaboration with Movimento dos Trabalhadores Sem Terra (Brasil) Supported by Goethe Institut Saõ Paulo, Pro Helvetia programme COINCIDENCIA - Swiss & South American Cultural Exchanges, Tax Shelter programme of the Belgian Federal Government
Premiere May 2023, NTGent