Alexander Zeldin: “A new work inspired by the story of Antigone”

My aim for the residency – as a writer and theater maker – was to grapple with how an ancient, iconic character such as Antigone can speak to me very personally but also to our current world. I never look to retell the same stories that we already know: “Antigone”, “Othello” etc. I believe that for stories to be really true, they need to find a new shape each time. For this reason, after a long search and allowing myself to be inspired by the landscape of Greece, both physical and cultural, I found myself rethinking the main dynamic between state and individual/natural law in Antigone. Instead of imagining how the state acts on the individual through the family, the state is the family in my play. This is how I was able to find the resonance of the ancient in the now. Being in Greece always had something that opened me up to listening and creative freedom.

In Hydra, I would wake up at 5am and go to my laptop to start writing in the dark. The rare privilege of being so isolated on a Greek island in January was that the time was completely my own and I could make whatever I would of the day. Working straight through to lunch, I would then abandon the laptop for a long walk in the afternoon. If I had any remaining brainpower in the evening, I would continue to write, but more often than not I would read to prepare for the next morning. I would gather my thoughts while listening to the sea. By the end of the residency, I had completed the first full draft of the play.

Alongside my grappling with Antigone, it was fantastic to meet young artists from Athens – many of whom had seen my play “The Confessions” six months ago in the city. During my time in Greece in January/February, they gathered to see a filmed version of my play “LOVE”. The plan was for me to present the process of how I write and make work, but, in reality, this event was a valuable way to continue a shared conversation with audiences and artists. I hope that Greece will always remain a part of the making of my work and that the conversations will continue.

Reading is of course an important part of writing. I reread Simon Critchley’s book “Tragedy, the Greeks and Us”. Beyond that, the reading and rereading that underpins this work for me has been of W. G. Sebald. For Sebald, contemporary tragedy creeps unexpectedly from memory, furrowing a path we didn’t know existed.

I also met with Iliana Dimadi for dramaturgical conversations, which continued after the residency when she and Konstantinos Tzathas visited my rehearsal room in London. We exchanged views on contemporary Greek dramaturgy of the family and how the “bio-state” was becoming a big concept. Their introducing me to this concept has been very helpful to the work.

Since the Onassis AiR residency, the play has been through further drafts. I have continued contextual research on modern families, on grief, on ownership and property. The National Theatre in London hosted a readthrough of one of the drafts with the actors and I received notes and ideas from various collaborators. I have also been working hard with fellow members of the creative team to establish the physical context of the play and how we will house the action on stage. More recently, the National Theatre hosted a two-week workshop – in this context I was visited by Konstantinos and Iliana. In the workshop, we worked through exercises and improvisations around the text. These improvisations are not so much about changing the text but about finding in the actors’ bodies a response to what I was trying to find in the writing. In turn, this will affect redrafting, and I am currently in the midst of what I think is draft four. The current task is trying to glue the story to the actors’ impression, and in doing so the hope is that the work will continue to deepen.

There is still much more work to be done before our opening night in London in October, but my isolation in Greece was an important springboard for the beginnings of a complex project.