Antiquity and beyond. The Dionysiac in Theodoros Terzopoulos’ theatre: Spatiality and temporality, history and community in the production of The Trojan Women (2017, 2018)

This paper examines the way in which the Greek director Theodoros Terzopoulos, taking the “Dionysian” as a central point of reference, engages in a dialogue with Greek antiquity through his staging of ancient drama and his conception of the tragic, particularly in relation to human community and history. The analysis focuses on his production of Euripides’ The Trojan Women (Ancient Odeon of Paphos, 2017 – Ancient Theatre of Delphi, 2018 – Japan/China tour, 2019), a play constructed as a polyphonic lament set against the backdrop of violence and suffering engendered by a historical catastrophe. This production, at the dramaturgical core of which lies the theme of divided cities in the Eastern Mediterranean, is selected as a case study because of the intensified role of identity and otherness achieved through the use of a multinational and multilingual cast. The analysis focuses on temporality and spatiality, as well as on the use of language, considering both their phenomenological manifestations and their ideological resonances. Through this lens, the paper seeks to elucidate how these parameters are linked to an understanding of history, identity, and community, at the core of which lies the reactivation of the tragic.