“Antigone's Slippery Slopes” ***
By Aron Canter (guest reviewer)
From time to time Theatre's Leiter Side will be posting reviews of Off-Off Broadway shows my schedule prevents me
from seeing. I hope you find the expanded coverage useful. Sam Leiter
Sophocles’ Antigone is ripe for a re-imagining; the tragedy’s
themes—polis vs divine law, and including, but not limited to, justice,
dignity, feminism, fate, and love—are easily extrapolated, modified, or made
universal. There have been numerous modern adaptations of the original. For
example, Jean
Anouilh’s celebrated rendition (1944), written in Nazi-occupied France,
focuses on obstinacy in the face of tyranny. Philosopher Slavoj Zizek wrote The
Three Lives of Antigone, an impressive, psychoanalytic contribution to
the repertory. Both of these examples, while independent, build from a
foundation of a deep understanding of the original work’s ideas and
complexities.
Antigone: Lonely Planet, written and
directed by Lena Kitsopoulou, and acted in Greek with English subtitles, handles its source material with the care of a
drunk carnival barker, or, more aptly, a cocaine-induced skier. The performance
is wild to the point of unhinged; it’s provocative and potentially offensive yet
seemingly purposeful. This latest addition to the tomb of Antigone’s
retellings deepens our understanding of the classic in unexpected and circuitous
ways but only if you’re willing to handle it.
Four skiers in full ski garb—skis, poles, helmets, goggles, and
red, form-fitting jumpsuits—discuss the play, and related aspects of their
lives, as part of a panel discussion. The performance is ostensibly a public
lecture concerning Antigone, sponsored by the Public Theater as part of the
Democracy Is Coming festival. Skiers understand the plight of Antigone, the
theory goes, because the danger of their vocation and the dedication to their practice
resemble Antigone’s experience.
As they attempt to discuss the tragedy, their winding, comical
dialogue drags them from one wild theme to another. The three central ones are
passion, independence and self-sabotage, each relayed with subtlety and taste.
The panel/theatre conceit functions effectively in involving the
spectators in the onstage activities, keeping the energy alive. Not that the
performance needs any help sustaining its energy. The style, buttressed by the twisting,
repetitive, comedic text, has a manic fever pitch. Every tangent ends in an
edict. One performer when I attended almost blew a blood vessel protesting the lack of
ski-friendly bathrooms. The stamina and intensity of the performers is
engrossing and commendable.
These bursts of meandering dialogue and monologues are generally
not meant to stir feeling but to be funny, and they frequently are. The comedy
is grotesque and over the top, Adult Swim-style. It may not be for a Public
Theater audience but the one I sat with responded with tacit interest. There’s a lot of fake
blood and a lot of tongue-in-cheek mockery. It’s fun to the point of
exhaustion. Comedy is the conduit through which the major themes are explored.
While there's little fealty to Sophocles’ original, nor need there be, the production does attempt to tackle some of the play’s
issues. It’s doubtful Sophocles considered Antigone to be a classic liberal but
many theater makers have read into her a passionate streak and will to live
dangerously. This production makes sure we notice this.
The treatment of imprisonment is interesting. It suggests that
Antigone’s literal imprisonment in the cave, where she’ll be left to die, is
reflected in our contemporary psychological lives. This is represented by having one
of the skiers, in a video shown across the backdrop, bludgeoned and bloodied
by a bear, sexually assaulted by law officials, and placed in a translucent
box. The performer, in an identical box, is wheeled on below her video self.
Her dual presence, incongruous yet identical, creates a thoughtful moment
that brings up feelings of claustrophobia and psychological stress.
Unfortunately, this is one of the work’s few such insightful parts.
In general, its wild comedy is more exhausting than entertaining, its
themes never coalescing into meaning.
The Public Theater/Onassis
Festival
425 Lafayette Street
Through April 20
Aron Canter
studied theatre theory and alternative performance at The New School and is
working toward an Art History masters at Hunter College. He has been a theatre
and art critic, a supernumerary at The Metropolitan Opera, and currently works
as a medical professional. aron.canter@gmail.com
