to download the Antigone Education Pack - Derby Theatre

15 Pages·2014·1.57 MB·English

by  Sarah Seddon

ANTIGONE
by Roy Williams
Education Resource Pack
created by theatrestudy.co.uk
this pack will be updated during rehearsals summer 2014
A Pilot Theatre, Derby Theatre! & Theatre Royal Stratford East Production
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 1
Contents
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I Introduction" " " " " " " " 3
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Tour Dates"" " " " " " " " 4
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Director’s Vision# # # # # # # # 5
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Writer’s Vision# # # # # # # # 6,7
Design" " " " " " " " " 8
Who’s Playing Who? - The Cast# # # # # 9
Sophocles Antigone" " " " " " " 10
Character Equivalents from Sophocles to Williams" " 11
Theatre in Ancient Greece" " " " " " 12
Aristotle’s Theory of Tragedy## # # # # 13
Bring Out Your Dead - ancient Greek burial rites" " 14
Further Resources" " " " " " " 15
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 2
Introduction
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When Creon refuses to bury the body of Antigone's unruly brother, her
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anger quickly turns to defiance. Creon condemns her to a torturous
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R Death - she's to be buried alive.

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B Acclaimed playwright, Roy Williams, takes Sophocles' play and, by placing it

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into a contemporary setting, brings this classic tale up-to-date.
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A timeless story about loyalty and truth, about how we make meaning out of
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life and death and what, in the end, really does matter. !
Directed by Pilot Theatre's Marcus Romer.
Please note this play contains strong language
This Education Pack was created by Helen Cadbury and John Wilkinson for
TheatreStudy Publications and provides a background to the production.
Reproduction is only permitted for classroom use.
This pack will be updated during rehearsals to include interviews and
ideas for classroom follow up work.
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 3
Tour Dates
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L OPENING VENUE
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19th September - 4th October – Derby Theatre

Y Performance times: (Mon – Sat), 7.30pm Matinee performances selected Thus &
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Y Tickets: Adults: £10.50 - £25.50 Concessions: £10.50 - £23.50 School and group
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rates available. 16-25 year olds: £5 per ticket on Friday evenings.

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Box Office: 01332 593939 www.derbytheatre.co.uk!!!!!!!!!!!
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7-11 October - Northern Stage -Box Office: 0191 230 5151 or
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N www.northernstage.co.uk/
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13-14 October - Lakeside Arts Centre-Box Office: 0115 846777 / http://
www.lakesidearts.org.uk
15-18 October - Lawrence Batley Theatre-Box office 01484 430528 or
www.thelbt.org
21-25 October -York Theatre Royal-Box Office 01904 623568 /
www.yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
4-8 November -Watford Palace Theatre-Box Office 01923 225671 /
www.watfordpalacetheatre.co.uk
11-15 November -Gulbenkian, Canterbury-Box Office 01227 769075 or
www.thegulbenkian.co.uk!
18-22 November -Theatre Royal Winchester -!Box Office 01962 840440 or
www.theatre-royal-winchester.co.uk
25-29 November -Exeter Northcott Theatre -Box Office 01392 493493 or http://
www.exeternorthcott.co.uk/1
19th February - 14th March 2015 - Theatre Royal Stratford East
Box Office 020 8534 0310
http://www.stratfordeast.com/
Education Workshops
A range of in schools workshops will be available throughout the tour. Please
contact [email protected] for further details.
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 4
Director’s Vision
Marcus Romer
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LI What was the spark for Pilot to Well it’s tribal, so you have to know
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I commission a new version of which side of the fence you sit on. In a
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way it’s Montagues and Capulets, it’s
Antigone?
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factions, it’s postcodes, it’s where you
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R live, it’s how you're judged, it’s what
I knew I wanted to work with Roy

Y you wear, it’s who you’re seen with and
again, so I asked him what is the one
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E thing that you’ve always wanted to do? it’s what your family background is.
N Which is why all the references to the
Roy replied straight away: “I want to
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backstory around Eto and Orrin are
G write a new version of Antigone and I
TI want to do it in such a way that tells important and the Oedipus story is
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the story for now.” He says it’s one of
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always be marked, because everyone
those stories that’s always been one of
knows what happened with their
his favourites. It has a strong female
parents.
protagonist and lends itself to a
contemporary re-telling in the context
of a black British experience. When he What are the challenges in directing
mentioned Antigone, I was really this play?
excited by the idea of this classic piece
which can still speak to young people I think one of the challenges is working
about the destruction and misuse of on the scale of great tragedy while also
power, and about relationships dealing with the everyday language,
between parents, children and siblings. which Roy creates so brilliantly. We’re
Having tackled classics in the past, in a world of nightclubs, of factions
such as Romeo and Juliet, I have falling out and of two sisters dealing
sometimes felt bound by the tyranny of with grief and love. It’s not a soap
texts by well-known dramatists. We opera, even though the story wouldn’t
needed to make sure that we could do be out of place in Eastenders, it’s
what we wanted to do: tell this great classical theatre, so it’s about finding a
story, which actually is the root of all way to balance naturalism with a non-
those stories like Romeo and Juliet, but naturalistic style. We’re exploring how
in the language of today. to frame the play starting with Creo,
broken, going to hell because of the
mistake he’s made, but watched by the
How much do you think it’s about
CCTV cameras, as if he’s being
family and how much do you think it’s
watched by the gods. This is a world
about gang culture?
where the soldiers are the foot soldiers
of a criminal empire, but they’re also
the Greek chorus.
Marcus Romer
Artistic Director of Pilot Theatre
Published playwright, director and
actor
http://about.me/marcusromer
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 5
Writer’s Vision
meet Roy Williams
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L Why did you choose to adapt
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“this is the real world, as realised by
WI Antigone?
the muscular, agitated writing of
Antigone is my favourite Greek play. I
Y Williams”
O remain always struck by the power of
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an individual to reject society’s From The Press Review of Loneliness of the Long

Y Distance Runner
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I was intrigued to know if it was
O Greece, in the city of Thebes, but
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their accent, clothes and setting are
TI that I have written about before, i.e.
N now; so ‘now’ it would not look out of
the gangster culture that is too often
A place on the streets of the cities of
the life of a lot of young people today.
the UK. This was deliberate on my
It has always disturbed me to hear
part, to show the story of Antigone is
young people say that being in a
still relevant.
gang makes them feel powerful.
So did you find the gang world is a
But as we all know power does
good fit with the world of Ancient
corrupt. Creo, (Creon in the original
Greece?
play), begins the play feeling all-
powerful with his gang running ‘tings’
in Thebes. It is almost like he and Definitely. In the play we’ve got
others like him, have put aside other soldiers, and that’s the language
feelings that make us human, like used in gang culture, the foot soldiers
love, insecurity, fear, and masculinity, who do the bidding of the dealers.
in favour of a “live fast, die young” The language of war and revenge is
mentality. also used on the streets today, as it
was then.
As far as the characters are Continued overleaf
concerned, they are living in ancient
Roy Williams’ previous
productions
for Pilot Theatre
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 6
Writer’s Vision
meet Roy Williams ...continued
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LI By portraying Creo as a gang leader question him. This has stirred up his
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I rather than a king, it was an opportunity pride, which is eventually his downfall.
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for me to question this ‘live fast, die

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O young’ attitude, by having him face a I’m also interested in looking at
R multitude of human emotions as he different versions of masculinity. We

Y begins to lose everything and pays the see in Eamon a young man who is
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price for the life he chose. much more sensitive than his father. His
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N mother, Eunice, who could have been
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This so-called ‘gang life’ is no life at all. Tig twenty years ago, has made her
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I Not if it stops you from being human, choice and entered Creo’s world. She
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N which I feel it does. There are thinks she needs to toughen her son
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consequences to living this life, which up, but he’s listening to Tig. When Tig
Creo learns, at huge cost. speaks, she challenges all the
assumptions of the culture they’re living
in, she shows how they’ve become
What about the role of girls in immune to the disrespect for human
gangs? life, and how that extends to the
disrespect for her brother’s body. As
I addressed those issues directly in a she talks, she also reaches out to the
play I wrote for Theatre Centre, last soldiers, and they begin to listen to her.
year, about a young girl who has been
forced by her boyfriend to set up a
honeytrap. Her history involves having Roy Williams
been gang-raped by her boyfriend’s
PLAYWRIGHT
gang members. In Antigone I am still
exploring some of the issues of girls
and young men in gang culture, but
from a slightly different angle. I want to
address what it is that’s so appealing to
young people about joining a gang, and
how someone can stand up against
that.
When everyone else seems to be going
along with the pack, Antigone (Tig) says
‘no’. Creo has embraced this life, but
Tig is trying to smash the system,
because she’s seen what it’s done to
her family. She’s grown up with Plays:(at least) 33
violence and cycles of revenge and Home: ! London
she’s sick of it. She’s trying to say, Born:! ! 1968
‘whether you like it or not, you are
HONOURS: ! O.B.E.
human, you feel something and you
don’t have to live by these rules. You’re
kidding yourself if you think you can live
like this.’ Of course, Creo, shows his
misogyny. He puts her down, calling
her a ‘yat’, because she’s dared to
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 7
Design
by Joanna Scotcher
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An early view of the white card model, with the design still in
development. You can see how Joanna has based the shape on the
concrete scoops of the road bridge below. Pillars hold up the structure,
with industrial bins at either side of the stage.
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 8
Who’s Playing Who?
meet the cast
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Doreen Sean Sagar
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Sentry

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Gamba Cole Frieda Thiel
playing Eamon playing Esme
Savannah
Gordon-Liburd
Lloyd Thomas
playing Tig
(Antigone)
Soldier 2
Mark Monero
playing Creo
Oliver Wilson
Soldier 1 and
Tyrese
Luke James
playing Guard
and Acting ASM
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 9
Sophocles’ Antigone
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M Sophocles wrote the first version of introduction to Antigone, that he
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I Antigone around 442-441BC. It is owed his election to the popularity of
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normally referred to as one of his the play.
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three “Theban Plays” because it

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O concerns the royal house of Thebes
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during, and after, the reign of

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Tragedian
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E the King and Oedipus at Colonus
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O complete the trilogy.
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T Antigone is perhaps one of the
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A earliest political plays because it
concerns the problems of the polis,
the city state. By the fourth century,
only sixty years after Sophocles’
death, it had already become a
classic. The statesman Demosthenes PLAYS: ! over 100
ordered Creon’s speech on the HOME:! ATHENS
loyalties of a citizen to be read, as a Born: 496 BC
lesson in patriotism, to his political Died: 406 BC (aged
opponent Aeschines. Aristotle 90)
quoted the play repeatedly in the HONOURS: first
Politics. Sophocles held a number of prize at the Festival
of Dionysus 18 times
high ranking offices, military and civil.
It is recorded, in the ancient
• The writer of between 90 and 100 plays of which seven survive, Sophocles
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won 18 festival victories including one over Aeschylus. Apart from the
things
Theban Plays, his other four surviving plays are: Ajax, The Women of Trachis,
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Electra and Philoctetes, the last of which won first prize.
Sophocles
• He wrote about poetic theory as well as practice, writing a treatise called On
The Chorus. His ideas led to the use of the Periaktoi – a revolving prism
made of wood – to show scene changes.
• Unlike Aeschylus, Sophocles did not write linked trilogies. He only completed
Oedipus at Colonus at the end of his life.
• Sophocles developed many of Aeschylus’s ideas on drama. He increased the
number of people in the chorus from 12 to 15 but reduced their role to
commentary. By introducing a third principal actor, he created greater
complexity in and between his characters.
• He influenced Aristotle and many playwrights such as Seneca, Cornielle,
Dryden and T.S. Eliot.
Antigone www.pilot-theatre.com! 10