Theatre: Babies are Delivered by the Stork
Wednesday 4 November, 8.30pm (120 minutes), ages 13+

Anemona Theatre stages the play by Michalis Reppas and Thanasis Papathanasiou, directed by Marinos Xenofontos. Blending drama and comedy, it is set in German-occupied Thessaloniki in 1943 and follows two childless couples, struggling to survive, who shelter a Jewish escapee from Auschwitz. In Greek.
Cast, in order of appearance: Irini Konstantinou, Giannis Kokkinos, Christopher Greco, Elena Chileti, Gianna Lefkati, Angelos Chatzimichael and Nikolas Arkadiou.
Tickets: 18, 12 and 8 euros.

Screening: The Fifth Step (National Theatre Live)
Friday 6 November, 8.30pm (80 minutes), ages 16+

David Ireland’s play follows James, who after years in the Alcoholics Anonymous 12-step programme becomes sponsor to newcomer Luka. The two build a fragile friendship, but as Luka approaches step five, the moment of confession, truths emerge that threaten the trust on which both their recoveries depend. Finn den Hertog directs Olivier Award winner Jack Lowden and Emmy and BAFTA winner Martin Freeman in the production, filmed live in London’s West End. With Greek and English subtitles.
Tickets: 12 and 10 euros.

Presentation: Traces in Clay
Friday 13 November, 7pm (70 minutes)

A presentation of an interdisciplinary project to document, study, visualise and preserve the archive of ceramic artist Valentinos Charalambous, co-organised by The Cyprus Institute’s APAC Labs and Pylon Art and Culture.
Free entry.

Theatre: The 39 Steps
Tuesday 17 November, 8.30pm (85 minutes)

Lexi Theatre presents Patrick Barlow’s adaptation, directed by Marina Vrondi. Richard is caught up in espionage, conspiracy and the murder of a mysterious woman and goes on the run across Britain, meeting a series of eccentric characters along the way. The production is billed as a comedy thriller. In Greek.
Tickets: 25, 22 and 18 euros.

Music: Maria Papageorgiou, 4 in Groop
Friday 20 November, 8.30pm (120 minutes)

The Greek singer and songwriter performs with her band.
Musicians: Maria Papageorgiou (electric and acoustic guitar), Thanos Michailidis (drums), Giorgos Theodorakopoulos (keyboards, bass) and Evripidis Zemenidis (guitars, arrangements).
Tickets: 22 and 18 euros.

Music: A Tribute to Greek Operetta, Singing in the Storm
Sunday 22 November, 7pm (70 minutes)

Epilogi Cultural Movement presents excerpts from works by Theophrastos Sakellaridis and other popular songs of the era, sung by Cypriot classical singers with the Epilogi Cultural Movement Choir and a five-piece ensemble. Direction and script adaptation are by Angela-Kleopatra Saroglou, and musical direction and arrangements by Michalis Grigoriou.
Soloists: Margarita Elia, Mariza Anastasiadi, Marios Andreou, Stelios Georgiou, Danae Komodromou, Savvia Iakovou, Andreas Theodorou and Dimitris Sigalos.
Tickets: 15 and 10 euros.

Festival: Flash Festival
Friday 27 to Sunday 29 November, 7pm

The Flash Festival returns for a second year as a festival. It began in 2020 as FlashArt, an annual programme to support and showcase contemporary art production in Cyprus. This year’s three-day event includes 21S by Emiddio Vasquez and Stelios Antoniou, the performance TRACKS: From Stone to Concrete by x.ypno, and screenings presented with Queer Wave.
Tickets: 8 to 13 euros, or 30 euros for a festival pass.

Information and tickets: www.rialto.com.cy, 77777745.

The move settles the ownership of the theatre, which was founded in the 1930s and remains part of the city’s cultural heritage. Thirty-six years after the original campaign, Limassol residents have again mobilised to claim the theatre for their city, with dozens of public statements from people in the arts and beyond.

The handover follows a Cabinet decision approving the completion of the state’s acquisition of the building and its lease to the municipality. The state will give the theatre grants of 250,000 euros for 2026, 125,000 euros for 2027 and 75,000 euros for 2028, with no state funding planned after that. The Rialto company’s 12 permanent employees are to keep their employment status, benefits and working hours in a new company wholly owned by the municipality.

The building’s fate hung in the balance in the early 1990s. In September 1990, jewellery designer and activist Evis Michaelides learned from architect Maximos Pantelides that plans had been requested for the demolition of the Rialto and a car park in its place.

“We had to inform people immediately and mobilise them,” Michaelides told Phileleftheros.

The campaign

The first meeting was held at Chrysallida, a self-managed social space at 13 Christodoulou Sozou Street that had been a hub of the city’s alternative scene in the 1980s. Many more meetings followed. They drew people from different backgrounds, organisations and groups, and residents who felt that part of the city’s memory was at risk along with the old theatre.

“With its demolition, all those beautiful memories that everyone had lived since the ’50s would be torn down too,” Michaelides said.

Out of these meetings came the ‘Initiative to Save the Rialto’, an independent group with no hierarchy. Michaelides said its open assemblies were well attended, estimating that more than 150 to 200 people must have taken part.

After each assembly, members produced new leaflets to keep the public informed. The initiative also worked to highlight the theatre’s architectural value and to keep the issue alive until a solution was found.

Its original core included architect Sevina Floridou and sociologist Andreas Panayiotou, along with many other Limassol residents from culture, architecture, journalism, civil society and politics.

Panayiotou said Limassol already had a strong alternative movement by the 1990s. It was made up partly of people returning from studies abroad and was shaped by a climate that had begun forming in the 1980s. Campaigns to protect public spaces went back further still, to protests over beaches in the 1970s.

He said the movement had started campaigning to preserve Limassol’s historic buildings, focusing at first on the castle area, when the plan to raze the Rialto suddenly emerged. Meetings were held at Chrysallida, just down from the square, and a gathering on Athinon Street drew people from different walks of life.

“As soon as it became public, people began to mobilise. The mobilisation spread. We would meet, draft the texts, send them out, put out statements and leaflets, all written collectively,” he said.

A place of shared memory

Floridou said she had just moved to Limassol and rented offices in a side street in the area, believing she had come to a historic city. She soon found there were plans to change it rapidly, in line with an American, car-centred philosophy, by widening roads and demolishing buildings. Under those plans, she said, the Rialto was to become a supermarket or a car park, but either way it was destined for demolition.

She said the building’s value went beyond its architecture because it was bound up with the city’s collective memory and identity. It was perhaps one of the first public buildings where Limassol residents could attend shared events.

Its modern design stood out in both size and form in what was then a run-down area, Floridou said. The site had an Ottoman bath run by a man named Kefoglou and had at first been an open lot where donkeys were left. When the British arrived, the city was more developed to the west, towards the port, and no building stood out in the eastern part.

The Rialto changed that. “As soon as this building and its role in society appeared, it began to attract people who put on their best clothes to go there, almost as a ritual, to have a good time and listen to music,” Floridou said.

It hosted major figures, she said, and it was where Solon Michaelides played pieces for the first time.

She also stressed its role as a place where Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots met, saying it was open to both communities at a time when people were not divided. At an event marking the theatre’s reopening, she said, Nicos Anastasiades and Mustafa Akinci recalled going to the cinema there as children.

“There is no Limassol resident whose memory this building does not touch, because it was a place of intense socialising,” Floridou said. She linked this to the city’s film tradition: “It is no coincidence that we have so many directors from Limassol who grew up there and have all had a connection to it since childhood. It was our ‘Cinema Paradiso’.”

The cooperative bank steps in

In a 2019 article marking 20 years since the theatre reopened, Andreas Christou recalled his anguish at the time. “After a committee meeting where it became clear our efforts were heading for a dead end, I told Hambis Genethliou: ‘The Rialto is gone, we are losing it. It will be sold and demolished, and the memories of Limassol’s people will be demolished with it.’”

The solution came from the Limassol Cooperative Savings Bank. According to Christou’s 2019 account, Genethliou acted as a bridge between the initiative’s committee and the bank’s committee and proposed that the bank buy the Rialto and preserve it for Limassol. Michaelides credits Melios Georgiou with making the decisive suggestion to the bank’s committee. The proposal was adopted, and in February 1991 the bank bought the abandoned theatre.

The purchase was the start of a much larger project. Land behind the Rialto was acquired to extend the stage and support areas, and the bank also funded improvements to Heroes’ Square. An architectural competition followed in 1994, the project was put out to tender in 1996 and work began in 1997.

Architect Themis Themistocleous designed the new Rialto. The old cinema was restored and turned into a modern theatre that kept key features of its historic identity, and it reopened on 15 May 1999. The reopening marked a wider effort to revive Heroes’ Square and old Limassol.

Floridou said the facade was kept intact, as had been the aim. Stylised details in the auditorium were also retained, such as the side balconies and boxes, reflecting a building caught between classical and modern architecture.

Citizens’ say

Michaelides said the story’s significance lies in the struggle itself, in how a city’s residents, as active citizens, can organise, mobilise and bring about change.

Panayiotou said the campaign centred on citizens’ participation in the life of the city and their right to a say in decisions about the place they live. “There are buildings we fought whole campaigns to save, but they were eventually razed. Others, however, were saved,” he said.

He added that Heroes’ Square was where a cultural shift was taking place. “It was an area that Vasilis Michaelides also frequented. It was, and is, part of our history.”

Perhaps the Rialto’s relationship with the city is best summed up in Floridou’s words: “Heroes’ Square exists because the Rialto is there. And the Rialto is part of the square and of all of Limassol.”

(Featured image: a painting by Cypriot artist Spyros Dimitriades showing the Rialto and Heroes’ Square)

For one evening, one of the world’s most celebrated actresses will perform alongside  18 Cypriot musicians of the Commandaria Orchestra, who will bring Jarrell’s demanding contemporary score to life under the direction of French conductor Jean Deroyer.

Fanny Ardant at the centre of a rare theatrical work

Based on Christa Wolf’s novel, Cassandre gives a single, unbroken voice to the legendary Trojan prophetess –  a woman who foresees catastrophe, speaks the truth and is condemned not to be believed. In Cassandre, Fanny Ardant takes on a radically different form of performance: for the duration of the work, her voice becomes the central dramatic force, with the orchestra creating a constantly shifting musical environment. 

The production has been presented in major European cultural settings, including Avignon, Paris and Athens, and now comes to Limassol as part of the CITF programme. 

Alexander Weinstein Founder & Artistic Director of CITF: “Cassandre closes the SHE IS HERE season. Cassandre foresaw the war that, on the first attempt, made this performance fall through. October 2 is the second try. The piece is rarely staged live: 18 musicians, Christa Wolf’s text, Jarrell’s score, Ardant in person — an almost impossible set of conditions. If the actress in her most demanding form is what you’re after, this is that meeting.”

A César Award winner and one of the most recognisable figures of French cinema, Ardant has appeared in more than 80 films and worked with directors including François Truffaut, Michelangelo Antonioni, Alain Resnais, Franco Zeffirelli, Sydney Pollack, François Ozon and Roman Polanski.

A rare encounter between international theatre and Cypriot musicians

The participation of the Commandaria Orchestra gives the Limassol performance a particular local dimension. Jarrell’s work occupies an unusual space between theatre and contemporary music. The orchestra does not simply accompany the actress; it surrounds and interacts with her spoken performance, shaping the rhythm, tension and atmosphere of the text.

Bulat Latypov, Member of the CITF Expert Council and Chief Communications Officer at Freedom24: “For Cyprus, it is particularly meaningful that audiences have the opportunity to experience an artist of Fanny Ardant’s stature not simply as part of a touring concert, but within a complex international theatre production, where she shares the stage with Cypriot musicians. It is a rare and powerful moment when the international stage and local talent come together under one roof –  here in Limassol.” 

The performance will take place at the Pattihio Municipal Theatre in Limassol, with the event held under the auspices of the Mayor of Limassol.

PRACTICAL INFORMATION

Production: Cassandre — spoken opera by Michael Jarrell, based on Christa Wolf

Cast: Fanny Ardant · Conductor Jean Deroyer · Commandaria Orchestra (18 musicians)

Date & venue: Friday 2 October 2026 · Pattihio Municipal Theatre, Limassol

Language: French, with surtitles in Greek, Russian and English · approx. 70 min, no interval

Tickets: Buy tickets on SoldOut

More information citf.cy/2026/cassandre-fanny-ardant

The Commandaria Symphony Orchestra will play live alongside Ardant, conducted by French conductor Jean Deroyer. The show is part of the Cyprus International Theatre Festival (CITF) and is the closing performance of this year’s theme, SHE IS HERE, which is dedicated to the independent female voice on the contemporary stage.

It runs for 70 minutes without an interval. It is performed in French, with surtitles in Greek, English and Russian.

The work

Cassandra is a Sprechoper, or spoken opera: a monodrama for an actor and an orchestra. The Swiss composer Jarrell wrote it in 1994, basing it on German author Christa Wolf’s 1983 novella of the same name. Wolf had already shifted the focus of the ancient myth. Instead of Agamemnon speaking, or Cassandra appearing as a minor figure in the tragedy, the prophetess has her own voice and looks back on her life.

The story is set shortly before her death. At the gates of Mycenae, facing the end, she recalls memory, loss, war and prophecy, and her inability to share what she knows with others. She knows what is going to happen, but nobody believes her. Strings, wind and percussion will play live beside Ardant.

Ardant last appeared in Cyprus nine years ago, at the Medieval Castle of Paphos. She has performed the role on several European stages. The César-winning actress has worked with directors including François Truffaut, Michelangelo Antonioni, Franco Zeffirelli and Roman Polanski. In this piece she is almost alone before the audience, with the orchestra as her only interlocutor.

Cocktail with Fanny Ardant

The day before the performance, on Thursday October 1 at 2.30pm, the public can meet Ardant at the Crowne Plaza Limassol for ‘Cocktail with Fanny Ardant’. The informal afternoon event includes drinks and a conversation, moderated by independent journalist Katerina Gordeeva, known for her long-running interview project Skazhi Gordeevoy.

It opens with Opera Moments, a vocal tribute to Maria Callas by soprano Xenia Belolipetskaya, accompanied on piano by Zbigniew Maruska. The Callas tribute refers to one of Ardant’s stage roles, in Masterclass.

Cassandra is on Friday October 2 at 8pm.

Tickets are available through SoldOut Tickets.

The work

Cassandre is a Sprechoper — a “spoken opera,” or monodrama — by the distinguished Swiss composer Michael Jarrell, laureate of the Beethoven Prize. Based on Christa Wolf’s novel Cassandra and staged by director Hervé Loichemol, the piece gives the Trojan seer a single, unbroken voice: a woman who foresees catastrophe, is condemned never to be believed, and speaks the truth as her world falls. Ardant’s spoken text is carried, surrounded and at times masked by the live ensemble — the music sets the tempo of the words, not the reverse.

The performer

Fanny Ardant — César Award winner, more than eighty films, muse of François Truffaut, and a collaborator of Antonioni, Resnais, Zeffirelli, Pollack, Ozon and Polanski. She returns to Cyprus nine years after her memorable appearance at Paphos Castle, and has carried Cassandre across Avignon, Paris and Athens as a role she will not relinquish.

The Commandaria Orchestra

Eighteen Cypriot musicians take on Jarrell’s demanding contemporary score under Jean Deroyer, Music Director of Ensemble Court-Circuit (Paris) and a recognised interpreter of the composer’s work — a rare chance to hear a Cypriot ensemble perform a landmark of European music theatre live on their home stage.

Open Talk

The evening before the premiere, on 1 October at the Crowne Plaza Limassol Hotel & Spa, Fanny Ardant meets guests in person for an intimate cocktail and conversation. The talk is moderated by Katerina Gordeeva, an independent journalist known for her long-form interview project “Skazhi Gordeevoy” (“Tell Gordeeva”), one of the most closely followed interview formats in the Russian-speaking world. The evening opens with Opera Moments, a vocal tribute to Maria Callas performed by soprano Ksenia Belolipetskaya with pianist Zbyněk Maruška.

Patrons and partners

Cassandre is presented under the auspices of the Mayor of Limassol, with the Pattihio Municipal Theatre as Main Partner, and with the support of Pro Helvetia — the Swiss Arts Council and the Embassy of Switzerland to the Republic of Cyprus. Production by Les Visiteurs du Soir (France). A full list of partners appears below.

About CITF

The Cyprus International Theatre Festival brings landmark international theatre to Cyprus, pairing world-renowned artists with Cypriot talent and audiences. In its previous seasons it has presented John Malkovich, Kirill Serebrennikov, Pilobolus Dance Theatre and Divina Commedia, reaching more than 15,000 spectators and generating over 100 media publications across Cyprus, France and the United Kingdom.

From the Festival Director

Alexander Weinstein
Founder & Artistic Director · CITF

Practical information

Notes to editors

High-resolution photographs are available here: Press photo pack (Google Drive). For interviews, images and accreditation, please contact:

Cyprus International Theatre Festival

Alexander Weinstein — Founder & Artistic Director

office@citf.cy · citf.cy · @citf.cy

Partners & sponsors

Under the auspices of the Mayor of Limassol Municipality of Limassol

Main Partner Pattihio Municipal Theatre, Limassol

With the support of Pro Helvetia — Swiss Arts Council · Embassy of Switzerland to the Republic of Cyprus · Alliance Française de Limassol · Institut français de Chypre

Orchestra Commandaria Orchestra

Production Les Visiteurs du Soir (France)

Sponsor ASG Leasing

Official Flight Partner Cyprus Airways

Official Hotel Crowne Plaza by IHG, Limassol

Media Partners Phileleftheros · ZIMA Magazine

Event Partners Allegro · Crowne Plaza Limassol · Flowers Be Bloomy

The story

The play recounts the fratricidal conflict between the sons of Oedipus, as Polyneices, leader of the Argive army, seeks to reclaim the throne from his brother Eteocles, setting off an endless cycle of bloodshed. Award-winning director Lea Maleni presents a contemporary staging of the final tragedy in Aeschylus’s Theban cycle, drawing on myth, history and collective memory to explore fear, trauma and civil strife, and the increasingly blurred line between perpetrator and victim in cycles of conflict that repeat themselves.

A multilingual production

The production was created for the 29th International Festival of Ancient Greek Drama 2026 and supported by the Cyprus Centre of the International Theatre Institute and the Deputy Ministry of Culture’s Department of Contemporary Culture.

It features seven languages performed live on stage as part of its dramaturgy, including Arabic, Farsi, Somali, Hindi and Serbian, languages tied to regions marked by war, displacement and collective trauma, giving voice on stage to people’s experience of conflict and loss.

Details

The performance runs 75 minutes, with Greek and English surtitles, and is suitable for audiences aged 12 and over.

Creative team

Translation: Giorgos Blanas. Direction: Lea Maleni. Dramaturgical adaptation: Elena Triantafyllopoulou and Lea Maleni. Set and costume design: Giorgos Giannou. Music: Spyros Kallivokas. Movement: Panayiotis Tofi. Lighting design: Nikos Mylonas. Assistant director: Katerina Papageorgiou.

Language coaches

Kamal Eldin Salah (Arabic), Almas Aadan Abdulle (Somali), Raamaakrisshnan Nenmeli (Hindi), Afsaneh Fasihi and Maryam Edalati (Farsi), Dragana Konstantinou Markov (Serbian).

Cast

Yiannis Karaoulis, Andreas Papamichalopoulos, Marina Mandri, Myrsini Christodoulou, Anna Yiagkiozi, Vasilis Michael, Semeli Kyriazi, Frederiki Tombazou and Antonis Akritos, with young performers Solon Dellaporta and Damianos Kousiappas. Musicians on stage: Natasa Chatziandreou and Annita Skoutella. Photography: Pavlos Vrionides.

Performance photos: © Hero Morales.

Isabel Ordaz arrives in Cyprus as Hecuba in The Trojan Women, in the closely watched production by the International Festival of Classical Theatre of Merida that opens this year’s International Ancient Drama Festival. Her stage career spans more than four decades, taking in leading roles across the classical and contemporary repertoire alongside a strong presence in film and television. A single thread runs through her answers here: the duty of care against horror, community against individualism, empathy against violence. She talks about what she considers Greece’s great legacy, speaks of utopia as an act of resistance, of war turning language into a tool of dehumanisation, and of poetry that persists even after Auschwitz and Gaza, while revealing that she sees the mythical Trojan queen as “a teacher and a friend.”

After a career spanning decades in the theatre, what made you feel there was still something new to discover in Hecuba?

I have always been drawn to tragedy, both as the founding cultural legacy of the West and as a literary and theatrical form. I wanted to approach the deepest questions of the human condition and to seek out those elevated, almost transcendent gestures that only theatre can produce. Contemporary heroes tend to be more psychological. Tragic heroes are not defined in the same way by psychology. Psychology often pushes us towards individualism, whereas in tragedy the causes and consequences operate on a different plane altogether. To me, that is Greece’s great legacy: the idea of community as both purpose and duty. Carrying that idea into performance was something I found completely absorbing.

What do you think Euripides understood about war that so often escapes the heroic narratives of history?

From my own creative approach, I believe one of Euripides’ greatest achievements is that he overturns the traditional perspective: he does not turn his gaze to the hero, but to the victim. In doing so, he introduces an extraordinarily important dialectic, not only for his own era but for the centuries that followed. In a culture that still interpreted the world through mythology, Euripides shifts responsibility for catastrophe away from the gods and onto human beings. It is human actions, not the will of the gods, that shape human destiny. I find that deeply modern. This is where Euripides launches something very significant: he turns myth and the gods into a space for reflection, into a narrative with clear political dimensions.

Hecuba no longer has power, an army or a kingdom. But she has her voice. What is the power of that voice on stage today?

Hecuba’s voice remains just as relevant and necessary today. And that isn’t only about the position of women. It’s the possibility of seeing the world from a different vantage point and, at the same time, a woman’s right to shape the narrative of the world herself. Through Hecuba, a different set of values takes shape: motherhood, life, care, the power of dialogue and human encounter. Above all, war emerges as a failure, not an opportunity for glory.

What has Hecuba’s archetypal character taught you personally about human resilience and dignity?

Hecuba is indeed an archetypal figure, and that’s exactly why the questions one can put to her are endless. When it comes to dignity, what moves me is that by the end of the play she has lost almost every reason to hope. All her certainties and expectations have collapsed. And yet she keeps her dignity, because she fought and resisted until the end, remaining part of a community, existing alongside others. Hecuba does not grieve only for herself, or only for her children and her husband. She grieves for the whole people of Troy. She grieves for others. “My tears bear every name of abandonment,” she says, looking at her devastated homeland. Perhaps that is exactly where her dignity lies: in weeping for the pain of others.

What do The Trojan Women ask of us as citizens, and not merely as spectators?

Theatre always asks us to surrender to the experience, to dare to live it here and now, to become part of it, to recognise ourselves in the mirror it holds up to us. It’s an experience radically different from the one technology offers. I imagine that is exactly what The Trojan Women, through Euripides’ voice, was also seeking. At that time, theatre still carried a strong ritual, religious and communal dimension, and it helped people endure and process their own grief. That is theatre’s original purpose.

Where do you find light in such a dark story?

The light lies in poetry itself: in the beauty of the theatrical act, in the dramaturgy, in the language of the stage, in the way art challenges us either to be moved or to think more deeply. Perhaps that, in the end, is catharsis: a process of purification that happens collectively, together with others. War, as a machine for producing suffering, is unmanageable; it resists being translated into poetry. It seems impossible to turn it into poetry. How can one go on writing poetry after Auschwitz? How can one continue after Gaza? And yet I have the sense that it is precisely then that the need for poetry becomes even more urgent.

Where do you find reasons to hold on to hope?

Hecuba speaks very little about hope, at least in the way we understand that word today. She speaks more about taking on duty, about active participation, about the need to search for solutions. She names things, condemns, asks questions. There’s a line I find especially moving, when she addresses Andromache, the widow of her son Hector: “Andromache, it is for us to bear this suffering…” Hecuba does not turn away from the ordeal, from the weight of it. She takes on the responsibility. That endurance, that refusal to bend, is one of the most admirable things about this character. At the same time, tragedy hides something deeply dark and bottomless. I would call it “the tragedy of tragedy itself”: it offers no redemption. It may give form to vengeance, but it never arrives at forgiveness.

Do you believe that searching for meaning in a world that is falling apart is itself a form of resistance?

The search for meaning is never static. It shifts, it opens new paths of understanding, and that is exactly why it remains necessary. That, after all, is the core of storytelling, poetry and literature: the search for a meaning that speaks to each of us individually as much as to all of us together. What moves me most in Euripides is that he turns myth into an act of political responsibility. He asks us to strip the heroes, Odysseus, Achilles and the rest, of their heroic aura, and to judge them on their actions. I believe utopia is an act of resistance.

How do you see this production meeting audiences in Cyprus, a country that carries its own historical wounds and has, relatively recently, experienced loss, displacement and division?

All of that is so painful. We live in an age where globalisation is now an undeniable reality. But it is a reality that generates profit, and we shouldn’t forget that. What saddens me is that we fail to move beyond economic interest as the sole meaning we give to the word “global,” and that we so often struggle to give that word an ethical, genuinely human meaning instead. The fact that we still have to defend fundamental rights that were supposedly secured decades ago, the Geneva Conventions being just one example, is deeply troubling. Do prisoners of war have rights? Are there even prisoners of war anymore? And what kind of wars are we facing now? Today, public discourse about war talks more about investment and costs than about human lives. The degradation of language is staggering. No society is safe. Every country, even the ones we call “democracies,” can find itself in the position of the victim at any moment. That is why I believe both citizens and politicians need to think seriously about these questions. And it’s striking that The Trojan Women already raises all of this.

After such a rich theatrical journey, some roles leave a deeper mark than others. What place does this Hecuba occupy in your artistic and personal journey?

Some characters are so rich and multi-layered that you never really say goodbye to them. I would say Hecuba, Euripides’ Hecuba, which I see as a deeply poetic, aesthetic, human and political presence, belongs to that category. She will stay with me as a great friend. She already feels like a teacher to me. She has helped me grow as an actress, moved me deeply, and pushed me into extreme emotional territory. She is a fighting figure but also deeply tender, and her thinking has an extraordinary intellectual force. This has happened to me before with a few rare roles. I think, for example, of Saint Teresa of Jesus. Yes, Hecuba will remain, for me, a teacher and a friend. A precious companion.

INFO
Euripides’ The Trojan Women, a co-production of Producciones Come y Calla and the International Festival of Classical Theatre of Merida, directed by Carlota Ferrer, with Isabel Ordaz as Hecuba, at the Ancient Theatre of Curium, July 3 and 4, nine pm (doors at eight pm). Tickets: SoldOut Tickets, Stephanis Stores, 7000 2414. Running time: 110 minutes. Buses available from Nicosia.

The Nicolaideio Gymnasium of Paphos performed at the ancient Roman theatre of Avella in Campania, Italy, where the competition was held. The event was organised by ELEKPRO (Hellenic Educational Programmes), a non-profit, under a Greek-Italian partnership focused on ancient Greek theatre and its connections to contemporary social issues.

The first prize was shared with the Mousi School of Kastoria, whose entry involved the construction of a functional replica of an ancient Greek/Roman theatre. Both schools were awarded equally.

The production was directed by philologist Anastasia Christodoulou, who also wrote the scenario and designed the set. A live orchestra accompanied the performance.

Headmistress Daniella Pisteni-Mougiannou said the school’s participation was made possible with support from the Parents’ Association, the Municipality of Paphos, and other sponsors.

Production Contributors

Production Team

Scenario – Direction – Teaching:
Anastasia Christodoulou, Philologist

Set Design:
Anastasia Christodoulou, Philologist
Souzan Varkas Stefanou, Art Teacher

Choreography:
Anastasia Christodoulou, Philologist / Dimitra Sotiria

Masks – Poster Design:
Souzan Varkas Stefanou, Art Teacher

Costumes – Make-up:
Christa Charalambous, Physical Education Teacher
Antoniou Elena, Evangelou Christina, Ioannou Elpida, Manoli Manolia,
Stavropoulou Chrysovalantou

Music Supervision:
Dr. Kalliotheni Neokleous, Music Teacher

Live Orchestra / Music Ensemble

Piano: Arousiotis Giannis
Percussion: Gennadi Foniki
Clarinet: Karfi Giorgo
Bouzouki: Chatzichristofi Stefanos
Violin: Kouloglou Giorgo
Baglama: Kalotsou Thalassia
Vocals: Lamprianou Anastasia and Olympiou Olia
Cello: Staviou Ifigeneia
Trumpet: Panayi Anastasos

Cast (in order of appearance)

Peisetairos: Athanasiou Semeli
Euelpides: Kyriakou Danai

Servant (Enthia): Asprou Xanthoula
Servant (Manodorus – Manis): Ioannou Eleni

Servant of Tereus: Tryfonos Eleonoura
Tereus: Kondylis Stylianos

Chorus (Birds)

Faisinos Flaventos, Dimitra Sotiria, Karekla Anastasia, Liasidi Niki, Nikolaou Paraskevi, Olympiou Savvina, Charalambous Elisabet, Anastasiadou Maroulia, Georgiou Stella, Tryfonos Eleonoura, Christofi Andriana, Lamprianou Anastasia, Markou Antrea Agapi, Olympiou Olia

Priest: Aristeidou Maria
Oracle Seller: Christoforou Panayiota
Meton: Avditi Nepheli
Inspector: Eleftheriou Irini
Decree Seller: Ouraniou Loukia
Messenger: Kouzaleidis Theodoros
Iris: Katsounouri Ioanna
Herald: Kouttaris Xenios
Cinesias: Papanearchou Theodora
Prometheus: Kouzaleidis Theodoros

The project, THEO-MUSIC, is built around the Theatre of the Oppressed, the method created by Brazilian playwright and director Augusto Boal, and combines it with Deep Listening practices and participatory music improvisation. It has been developed in Limassol and Rome over recent months through intensive training sessions bringing together artists, educators, social workers, community musicians and volunteers.

In Cyprus the project is coordinated by MUS-E Cyprus, a Limassol-based NGO and part of the international MUS-E network founded by the International Yehudi Menuhin Foundation, in collaboration with the Italian organisation GIOLLI COOP. Deep Listening practices were led by Teresa Dello Monaco, director of MUS-E Cyprus, while the Theatre of the Oppressed sessions in both cities were facilitated by the founder of GIOLLI COOP, a translator of Boal’s work into Italian.

The organisers say the project responds to integration and social cohesion challenges in Europe and Cyprus, particularly those affecting migrants and refugees, and aligns with the EU Action Plan on Integration and Inclusion 2021-2027. A key outcome is a practical toolkit, alongside recorded seminars and video documentation from the training sessions.

The free four-hour workshop will be held at RESET’s Multifunctional Social Space in Limassol’s old town, on Heroes Square near the Cyprus University of Technology and the Rialto Theatre. It will introduce participants to the project’s methodologies and practical applications, and those attending will receive a Certificate of Participation. Admission is free, but registration is required.

CONTACT: Ms. Teresa Dello Monaco

MUS-E Cyprus

Email: teresa.monaco@musecyprus.org

Phone: 96 745796

Website: www.theomusic.eu

Location: Limassol, Cyprus

Directed by National Theatre Deputy Artistic Director Robert Hastie, previously known for Standing at the Sky’s Edge and Operation Mincemeat, the production is set in a world of power, privilege and uncertainty and offers a contemporary take on Shakespeare’s tragedy. Critics have described it as “compelling” (The Independent), “fresh and quizzical” (Financial Times) and “a beautifully choreographed production” (The Guardian).

The cast also includes Alistair Petrie as Claudius, Siobhán Redmond as the First Player and Geoffrey Streatfeild as Polonius. The creative team includes Ben Stones on set and costume design, Jessica Hung Han Yun on lighting, Alexandra Faye Braithwaite on sound and Kate Waters as fight director.

Filmed live at the National Theatre in London, the screening runs for 177 minutes including a 15-minute interval and is presented with English and Greek subtitles.

Tickets are priced at €12 and €10 and are available at https://rialto.interticket.com/program/hamlet-nt-live-3362 or by calling 77 77 77 45, Monday to Friday between 10:00 and 15:00.