Volume L, No 3, July-September 2012 - Ministry of Foreign Affairs

16 th International Festival of Ancient Greek Drama
As it does every year, the month of July
welcomed theatre friends from around the
world to the Pafos Ancient Odeon, the Curium
Ancient Theatre in Limassol and the Makarios
III Amphitheatre in Nicosia for the 16 th International
Festival of Ancient Greek Drama 2012.
The Festival was presented under the auspices
of the Cyprus Presidency of the Council of the
European Union and was organised by the Cyprus
Centre of the International Theatre Institute
in cooperation with the Cultural Services of the
Ministry of Education and Culture and the Cyprus
Tourism Organisation. The Festival programme
was selected by the Festival Selection
Committee.
Agamemnon’s Children
The Festival opened with a production of Agamemnon’s
Children by the Hessian State Theatre
of Wiesbaden, Germany. The adaptation combined
Euripides’ Iphigeneiain Aulis, Orestes and
Iphigeneia in Tauris, and Sophocles’ Electra into
a single storyline. The synthesis of these four
plays narrates the lives of Agamemnon’s children
from different points of view. Their actions
and their destinies make them both perpetrators
and victims in the vicious cycle of violence endemic
to Atreides’ myth.
Direction: Konstanze Lauterbach
Set design: Karen Simon
Costumes: Hannah Hamburger
Music: Achim Gieseler
Cast: Doreen Nixdorf (Iphigenia), Sybille Weiser
(Electra), Michael von Bennigsen (Orestes), Susanne
Bard (Clytaemnestra), Michael Günther Bard
(Agamemnon, Thoas), Michael von Burg (Pylades),
Uwe Kraus (Menelaus), Jörg Zirnstein (Servant,
Messenger, Phrygian, Apollo, Arcas), Magdalena
Höfner (Hermione)
Chorus: Evelyn M. Faber, Magdalena Höfner, Franziska
Werner
Agamemnon’s Children
Electra and Orestes, the Trial
Electra and Orestes, the Trial
The Cyprus Theatre Organisation’s production,
Electra and Orestes, the Trial, is an adaptation based
on Sophocles’ Electra, Euripides’ Orestes and Aeschylus’
Eumenides. Both the adaptation and the direction
are by Israeli stage director Hanan Snir and
are based on the technique of a “play within a play”.
The outer play deals with Electra and Orestes on trial
at the Supreme Court for the crime of matricide. In
court, the events that led to the murderous act are
presented against the backdrop of a contemporary
refugee camp.
Translation: Vayos Liapis
Adaptation/Direction: Hanan Snir
Set Design-Costumes: Melita Couta, Harris Kafkarides
Music: Demetris Zavros
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