"Seeking Oedipus" recently performed at the Athens and Epidaurus Festival in July 2008 and at the Macau Cultural Centre in October 2008
Mystical like all that is Great
Magical like all that is Mystical
We bring the myth of Oedipus on the stage
What is this that has tortured man for centuries, in his relationship with the parental figures?
What is the curse that has stigmatized Laius from the ancient myth until today, that was, to be murdered and substituted by his son?
The performance “Seeking Oedipus” reveals through one of the most ancient myths, the causes of the House of Lavdakides destruction
A performance created with the materials of Silence
The Silence that says the unsaid
The Silence that sanctifies
The verbose Silence of the body
The Silence of the gaze
The universal Silence of humanity
Along with the music that the bodies create, the narration of the Oedipus’ myth is subscribed directly to the audiences’ subconscious, creating an ultimately interactive performance, and by holding Apollo’s thread, it unifies the stage with the audience in a constant vigilance.
The Theatre of Silence presents the performance “Seeking Oedipus” , which is created with the ancient but also the absolutely timeless Art of Mime. An Art that was born in
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeNxwBpYqLzhmaEOvIEOQfeX2pKc3_gFJt2DEknAE2rKuqlzeL4cZkDTUKMIrzdI50bX-ybZAp5fi1ErrUHoFSJw02e-txQoj8g9dfADR9J1Wzu5F2XtnHfpTGYloxwa1gKVXkJehPedE/s320/THEATER_OF_SILENCE_1+147.jpg)
A few words about the play
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF-fORjDNnoXhRDY9Y5wTK_PZN-u5uENsvFRST0DcY4wzcdUyFKKxdfcOsNxXDbIk09T3VtoO0Rg7iYQ3Ro502lGIMBuUo93drE035nerkrk7Ci5Y5HHwRw_2eVCG9uU5Kne4E44kqIVc/s320/THEATER_OF_SILENCE_1+199.jpg)
Six actors play the mythic heroes linked to the cursed house of the Labdacides on a “dangerously inclined plane”. Picking up the tale from the family’s original sin – the “guilty passion” Laius, the son of Labdacus and father of Oedipus, nursed for Chrysippus, which leads to the youth’s suicide – the cast attempt a new reading of Oedipus’ patricide and incest.
Aspasia Kralli, who studied mime at the Marcel Marceau Paris International School of Mimodrama, employs the language of the body in her approach to the tragic Oedipus cycle in which psychoanalysts have sought expressions of the subconscious and timeless questions relating to parents’ relationships with their children and to human existence
Written & Directed by Aspasia Kralli
Music: Stavros Gasparatos
Lighting: Lefteris Pavlopoulos
Movement: Zoi Chatziantoniou
Set Designer: Aspasia Kralli
Stage Sets: Adrian Fluture
Costumes & Props: Ioanna Tsami
Assistant Director: Vassia Paraskevopoulou
Cast:
Teiresias: Aspasia Kralli
Oedipus: Giorgis Tsambourakis
Laius: Ilias Meletis
Jocasta: Malamatenia Gotsi
Shepherds 1 & 2 – Meropi-Sphynx: Kostis Koronaios
Chryssipus: Jason Bitter-Kourounis
The art of Mime and the Theatre of Silence
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPSSTIq9Gcg-NM5JTrOi8veDpH-hH2nLP20mB8Vx9nfoVnohZaU_T_W3ivfonwYgPGh1wL-g5XGSfXJC5xRo1cAabY111lrJgO3if2tMUj2AjNV5-hoOD1wElgQvgVk4TMCo4LFS0-isk/s320/photo_plays3c_big.jpg)
The theatre of Silence (mime) is an international theatrical genre. The absence of speech and the easily recognizable body language that is common to all people, as well as the condensed time can give to the theatrical pantomime the place that poetry possesses within literature. I apprenticed with Marcel Marceau, the great mime and teacher. The visibility of the invisible world the Marceau creates is an undeniable fact. He urged me (because of mime's Greek origin*, and mine also!) to create my own language of mime. I managed to do this, when I finally felt more mature as a theatrical actress of prose. Thus, the Theatre of Silence was born in 1993. In my first performance, (Medea of Silence), I experimented on my own and on myself, trying to express with the body's language the deeper feelings of the myth's heroine. Later on, through a course of seminars, in which I started to apply my new 'mimical' method, I chose a group of actors which I used in the Theatre of Silence performances. Mime is the Art that makes the visible world, invisible. And by the word 'world' I don't just mean the world of object, but also the soul's invisible world , the world of big and small emotions. Mime is the Art that allows those things that cannot be said with words, to be expressed with the language of Silence. It is the Art that makes the gaze, the fingers and the toes, the wrists and the ankles, the face's muscles and breathing have their own entity, which is almost independent from the rest of the body. I believe that every actor is a mime, with the deep meaning of the word, by the nature of his/her art. According to Aristotle, tragedy, is 'the imitation (mimesis) of an action that is serious and also, as having magnitude, complete in itself; in language with pleasurable accessories, each kind brought in separately, in the parts of the work; in a dramatic, not in a narrative form; with incidents arousing pity and fear, wherewith to accomplish its catharsis of such emotions'. Since all humans' primordial movements and emotions are innate and as these contribute to the everyday existence (thinking, walking, running, waiting, laughing, hurting, crying, falling in love, being afraid, etc.), the actor using the body's memory and the emotional memory that he has been trained to have, re-enacts-imitates these movements and emotions thus constituting the theatrical praxis.
Aspasia Kralli
* The Art of Mime is an ancient Greek and was born in Greece several years before the Ancient Drama. The ancient Greek mimes re-enacted myths, on which the great Greek poets of Greek Drama (Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides) were, based their plays later on. Relevant Bibliography:
- 'Mime and Mimes' by Marios Ploritis, Kastaniotis Publications
- 'Saint Bacchus' by Alexis Solomos, Dodoni Publications
Love Bites (2002-2003) Ex Machina Theatre
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj52TyrlEpU1LQsX1rBX5vBsNPaPU68R67RogvNzz4D8esMApLoyIMByrizo3vWtepiDtOcSkWq3NDNmi6AQOuN_j1uPOaYewV07PqtiJrgjihjinXKEFjjpvCGoMnG9f-K-9K42DmSLHQ/s320/photo_plays5_big.jpg)
Naughty Class (2000-2001) Ex Machina Theatre
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIUCOA4UMZvg4l8I17lLHzGcLofpKNvUO9xknFPeB1UnSzp85yY_EP6ZWoZAAAaBEMoYG45TZ_q3Fiq-CklKy9c0hwjDT94uNebKVTvvwGbS96nWv6ekglgPVaSLu8mh7VLXqjNxzZQtY/s320/photo_plays4b_big.jpg)
Pentheus Suffering (1996-97-98) Ex Machina Theatre
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsq5Q4spSeerXOyrkLNlUyc7I0FJFbBe83X5LAizCV34oQrWSq_NC5yVdP8DNNwDRy1A4NIfrwknZn99PUouAYdFa4esPPW017-JdRBkeXgNwlRwKgHGUBaGr8PFGc0K2zrqY6-p2NgDQ/s320/photo_plays3b_big.jpg)
Hades in a Room (1994-95) Theatre Embros
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIDWdZlUIJZBPlInzVLqImtcICqmv0V3EeOYIVGg__Ls3Eunb-kT_S9lmJDtKeDdE3kIBw28asq5jHCpRLMmje-ZEPQqO8nu4rwg7FkVGchZySDI1BoSd-SZd67t1XbEifRZo0nyWuMeM/s320/photo_plays2_big.jpg)
This play follows Orpheus' and Eurydice's course, from the beginning of their love, to Eurydice's death, then to Orpheus' descent to Hades whose forbidden look behind him and his intolerance led him to his self-destruction namely the final death of Eurydice and his absolute misery. The god Hermes interferes in all this by quipping the heroes or by leading them to their destiny.
Medea of Silence (1992-93) Theatre Studio Ilisia
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUQV6l-fQ_30VpT65jADvjw7cbh8VIEHBLG287L2WFI3d7BwSifLwSLiPhy7BeUGd8YqaZrwHx-nhiERCAkTvKEClxYs21fsQJYCkqtdwAto1Jo8MNMEZHCk-Nz_ci5u0DchZuTMDgpgE/s320/photo_plays1_big.jpg)
This play refers to Medea, the brutal solitude of love, birth and revenge. It is a play for one actress, several objects (which have the equivalent size relevance as in Alice in Wonderland) and a mask. The play was performed for two consecutive years due to the public's intense display of interest for this debutant genre at that time in contemporary Greece.