Skip to main content

ALCESTIS by Euripides

FRESH TARGET THEATRE ENSEMBLE, Cyprus
  • Monday, July 23
    “Skali” Amphitheatre, Aglantzia
  • Saturday, July 28
    Paphos Ancient Odeon
  • Monday, July 30
    Curium Ancient Theatre
  • Performances start at:

    21:00

    Please arrive at the theatre before 20:45

Fresh Target Theatre Ensemble participates at the Festival for the first time and presents one of Euripides’ most intriguing and enigmatic tragedies, Alcestis.

With Apollo’s assistance, Admetus, King of Pherae, has secured an unusual privilege: when his time comes to die, he will be spared, provided he can find someone to take his place in the Underworld. But who loves Admetus enough to give up their life for him? In the end, no one volunteers to die on his behalf except for his young wife, Alcestis, who bids farewell to life and embarks on a journey to the Underworld. Everyone in the palace mourns the loss of their devoted queen, who only one hero can bring back to life, by taking on Death and besting him.

Euripides’ oldest surviving play is characterized as a tragicomedy that rejects physical determinism and challenges deaths dominion, leaving many unanswered questions.

  • With English surtitles
  • Translation:

    Konstantinos Christomanos

  • Direction:

    Paris Erotokritou

  • Set design:

    Yiorgos Yiannou

  • Movement direction:

    Panagiotis Tofi

  • Music:

    Vasiliki Anastasiou

  • Costume design:

    Rea Olympiou

  • Lighting design:

    Vassilis Petinaris

  • Sound design:

    Yiannis Christofides

  • Assistant to the director:

    Maria Masonou

  • Production coordinator:

    Nedie Antoniades

  • Visual communication:

    Demetris Sotiriou

  • Executive producer:

    George M. Ioannou

Cast:
  • Alcestis:

    Niovi Charalambous

  • Admetus:

    Andreas Papamichalopoulos

  • Pheres:

    Spyros Stavrinides

  • Death/Heracles/Chorus:

    Yiannis Karaoulis

  • Maidservant/Chorus:

    Myrsini Christodoulou

  • Apollo/Chorus:

    Andreas Koutsoftas

  • Servant/Chorus:

    Savvas Menoikou

Chorus

The Amalgamation Choir:
Vasiliki Anastasiou,
Myrto Aristidou,
Demetra Hadjiyianni,
Argyro Christodoulou,
Anastasia Prokopi Taki,
Maria Masonou

  • Director’s note

    Alcestis is a play about the presence and absence of love. However, approaching a play from this aspect opens up a vast plain of exploration that is difficult to set boundaries to. Therefore, our approach focuses on love, seen through the lens of loss or the fear of loss, a loss with which love is indivisibly connected – possibly constituting the other side of the same coin. In this way the plain of theatrical exploration and discovery becomes more distinct, concise and widespread.

    The play begins a few minutes before Alcestis’ death – specifically during her last moments – and ends with her “reattachment” to Ademtus. It is thus a play that begins with an impending death (separation) and ends with and impending “marriage” in the sense of reconnection.

    I regard Alcestis to be a contemporary play which dissects, in detail, a couple’s relationship, posing questions that are constantly present in people, their relationships to others as well as their fragile nature. At the same time, it is a deeply human play, where the tragic co-exists with the comic, the lament with the celebration, the loss with the miracle.

    Paris Erotokritou

  • FRESH TARGET THEATRE ENSEMBLE

    Fresh Target Theatre is a multi-award-winning, not-for-profit theatre company whose goal it is to create innovative and, above all, vibrant and alive theatre by placing actors as well as their creative process at the forefront. The core concept which runs through all our productions is a commitment towards a dynamic exchange between actor, space and audience while addressing both the emotional and intellectual universe of each audience member through themes which focus and explore various socio-political aspects of contemporary life.

    Fresh Target Theatre was founded in March 2008 by Paris Erotokritou, Yiannis Gavrielides and George Ioannou. Since then, the company has worked with actors and artists from Greece, Cyprus, the United Kingdom and Australia in both its national and international productions, having received dithyrambic reviews in the press and as evident by an ever-increasing audience.

    Our international partnerships, along with various educational activities concerning the art and techniques of theatre, are yet another area Fresh Target Theatre is moving towards by annually presenting theatre companies and artists from abroad.

    www.fresh-target.com