Nowhere in the international arts does the classic meet the modern quite as head on as at the Epidaurus Festival – Athens’ annual celebration of contemporary creativity and performance, which has undergone a radical rebirth in recent years.
Once a stuffy institution revolving exclusively around classic Greek dramas staged in ancient venues, under the stewardship of director Yorgos Loukos since 2005, Epidaurus has been dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century, and now showcases the cutting edge of fresh and vibrant theatre, music, literature, dance and performing arts – both national and international – in the Greek capital throughout the summer months.
The festival continues to frame itself within Athens’ and the surrounding area’s many treasures of antiquity, by staging performances at the likes of the 2nd century AD Odeon of Herodes Atticus on the south slope of The Acropolis (overlooking the New Acropolis Museum), and the marvelous 4th century BC Epidaurus Ancient Theatre and Ancient Epidaurus Little Theatre in the Argolis prefecture of the Peloponnese.
But new, modern venues have been embraced and even created too – such as the Apo Michanis Theatre, which is housed in a 1930s textile factory, and the Peiraios 260 complex, converted from an old warehouse. Ticket prices have been slashed, making the festival much more accessible to a younger audience. The success of Loukos’s overall approach is plain to see – Epidaurus now attracts a much more diverse and youthful crowd than ever before, and attendance figures reached 237,000 last year.
In spite of the credit crunch, festival bosses will be hopeful of continuing to build on their successes further with another attractive programme in 2009. The festival has already hosted productions in June by international contemporary theatre directors including Italian Romeo Castellucci and Belgian Guy Cassiers, and shows such as Alain Platel and Fabrizio Cassol’s radical dance piece Les Ballets de ci de là will follow in July.
Various shows have been co-produced in collaboration with leading companies from around the world, including New York’s Brooklyn Academy of Music, London’s Old Vic, the Festival d’ Avignon and Vienna’s Wiener Festwochen. Greek talent will be represented by the likes of the Nova Melancholia Theatre Group and highly-respected young dancer Lenio Kaklea. Some glamour will be brought to proceedings by big such stars as Jeanne Moreau, in Amos Gitai’s The War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness, and Helen Mirren, in a version of Jean Racine’s Phèdre, staged at the Epidaurus Ancient Theatre – a chance to admire, from the vantage point of the same hard stone benches that numbed Greek posteriors many centuries ago – an ancient beauty in more ways than one.