The play was mostly done in a form of mime - ideal for cross-cultural audiences - although there were a few words in Greek, and quite a bit of singing which, we gather, was in the original ancient Greek. There are just four actors working full-time in Antidote this year, so between them they took all the necessary parts with clever changes either on or off stage. As someone who has very little Greek, I would have been rather lost if I didn't know the approximate story (an outline can be found here, for anyone who doesn't). But apparently all children in Cyprus know the tale, almost like British children know about Robin Hood or King Arthur.
Dan went to one of the rehearsals during the week and took these photos:

These were the basic costumes - plain black and simple - and used for the sailors, when they weren't taking other parts.


Antidote aim to take their productions into the Greek schools, to children who have sometimes seen almost no live theatre before. I should think 'The Odyssey' will go down very well with the teachers, and probably the children too. It's not really for very little ones, but there were children of about eight and nine at the premiere who were transfixed.
The whole thing took just under an hour, and despite my lack of Greek was very enjoyable. There was almost continual music, written by a local composer, which was played by just two musicians: a violinist and an accordian player. There will be several more public performances before the end of the year in addition to those booked by schools.
2 comments:
That sounds really cool
'The Odyssey' in less then an hour! That's a feat in itself. Glad you enjoyed it. I always love the hun thinks they do for children's theatre.
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