23 May (Sun) 8:00 pm

24 May (Mon) 7:00 pm

If, a performance based on Euripides’ Iphigenia in Aulis

Written, directed and set designed by Pawel Passini

Music by Paweł Passini, Lukasz Walewski

Lighting by Marcin “Kabat”  Kowalczuk

The last, “posthumous” tragedy by Euripides, a great magician of ancient theatre, represents an unusual last will. Apart from the dark tale of a father who wants to slay his daughter in plain view of the degenerate army of jaded soldiers, Iphigenia offers more. The mercilessly intricate theatrical score hides the mechanism of metamorphosis, or of throwing off masks, mastered by Euripides. First of all, Iphigenia is a trap that ensnares actors. Faced with a succession of character transformations, they cannot get off stage or stop acting.

The pseudo-king lures his daughter to an army camp on the pretext that she is to be married to a hero who turns out to be a coward. The desperate girl, who is charge of the show of her own death, is at the last minute replaced by a young roe dear. But she later returns under the guise of a soldier and tries to convince her despairing mother that her child’s death was only make-believe. You cannot get off the stage, you can only put on a different mask. The gods need actors, or they would kill each other out of boredom. How will this playful tale resonate at the beginning of the 21st century?
 

The piece is a co-production of neTTheatre – Teatr w Sieci Powiazan (Lublin) and MITOS, the Center of Performing Arts (Limassol), produced as part of an artistic and research project called “The Song’s DNA.”