“Antigone in the Amazon is fierce, it’s furious, it drives home the message“
Alethea Mouhtouris
Roslyn Packer Theatre
Sydney Festival
4-8 January 2025
“Many things are monstrous, but nothing is as monstrous as man” – Antigone (Sophocles, Greek playwright, 441BC).
There’s theatre for entertainment, theatre for education, and then there’s theatre for changing the world. Falling squarely into the last category, this production is a complex meld of the ancient Greek tragedy, Antigone, set against murderous politics and the fight by landless farmers for social justice in Brazil.
Antigone in the Amazon was created in collaboration with the Landless Workers Movement (known as Movimento dos Trabalhadores Sem Terra, or MST) in the state of Pará. An allegorical play, it sets Antigone against the 1996 massacre of 19 MST protestors on a federal highway, with the shared theme of state above humanity.
Four performers appear on stage – Frederico Araujo, Pablo Casella, Sara De Bosschere, and Arne De Tremerie. Their performance is threefold – they play key roles from the Greek play embedded in a brutal re-enactment of the massacre, and also share their experiences of rehearsing Antigone in Pará with survivors.
Equally, if not more important, are the MST activists/performers who appear via video on a three-panel screen – Gracinha Donato, Kay Sara, Ailton Krenak, and Célia Maracajá, who perform aspects of Antigone – as well as a choir of MST activists and massacre survivors.
The Greek tragedy focuses on Antigone who defies her uncle, the new king Creon, to bury her slain brother Polyneices, against the king’s decree. Driven by love and loyalty, her actions ensure her brother’s body is protected from carrion-eating dogs, and Creon sentences her to death. Her fiancé Haemon is Creon’s son who battles for her life, and it’s here that the discussion of state (that is, control) versus humanity comes to the fore.
As Antigone takes her own life; as her grief-stricken fiancé Haemon takes his own life and devastates his royal father, Creon, who realises his errors too late; as the massacre survivors roar their anguish over the bodies of friends and family – the devastating losses and the fury are visceral. Mythology and reality are the same thing.
And underpinning the theme of destruction is the relentless annihilation of the earth’s “heart” – the Amazon – which is being eradicated in the self-serving interests of capitalism and greed.
The two-hour production is absolutely compelling at every turn. Swiss theatre director, playwright, and essayist, Milo Rau is a fierce advocate for changing the world.
The set is relatively simple – a set of instruments for musical accompaniment, and a table and white plastic chairs reflecting the simplicity of the Amazonian village we visit in one of the videos. The stage is covered by a thick layer of earth, embraced by the live performers, and used to great effect during the re-enactment of the massacre. And because the earth is constantly being walked on and interacted with – at some stages, the earth is thrown towards the audience – the stage is always changing, reflecting the Earth itself, particularly the Amazon, changing with human interaction. Filmed elements include tiny doses of unintended reality – the roar of a motorcycle passing by in the night, for example – driving home the team’s goal of connecting the story of Antigone with the people of Brazil.
Antigone in the Amazon is fierce, it’s furious, it drives home the message that we are bitterly failing as caretakers for the planet and, most of all, for each other. My 21-year-old companion was visibly shaken and described the production as confronting. If that’s what it takes to change the world, then we need more productions like this.
As one performer says: “Hurry, save what you love.”
Alethea Mouhtouris, Theatre Now
