Antigone

by Sophokles newly translated by Anne Carson

seen at the Barbican on 26 March 2015

The play is directed by Ivo van Hove and stars Juliette Binoche as Antigone and Patrick O'Kane as Kreon.

A wide platform with some spaces at the front (between the platform and the true stage level) which could be low shelves for books or folders in an office, or for ornaments in a living room. A high wall at the back along the whole width of the stage, with a narrow vertical rectangle cut in its centre and surmounted by a large circle almost exactly covered by a disk. The space beyond the rectangle is black, an entranceway into some unfathomable space. Light bleeds around the edges of the disk covering the circle.

Thus the setting for Ivo van Hove's striking interpretation of 'Antigone'. As the play begins, dust is blown across the stage, and the huge wall becomes a screen onto which is projected a dry landscape engulfed in a dust-storm. The disk slowly moves in a great circular sweep until it completely disappears, revealing a dazzling circle of light, as if a solar eclipse were just ending.

Everything is stripped back, leaving the characters completely exposed in their uncompromising positions, and allowing absolute prominence to the ethical dilemmas explored by the play. Juliette Binoche is an impassioned Antigone, distraught, resentful of her sister's unwillingness to join her, and later scornful of her attempt to share the blame, utterly sure of her path and reckless of its consequences. She is perhaps too histrionic at the crisis points of her outrage, but it is otherwise a fine performance. At one point she sits casually on a sofa, confiding directly to the audience, from one human being to others; but still Antigone must take her path to death and away from us. Patrick O'Kane's Kreon is implacable and unbending, also utterly sure of his stance, unmoved by his niece's arguments, dismissive of his son's intercession, and enraged by Teiresias's warnings of catastrophe. And so, catastrophe ensues. 

There is a measured stateliness to the proceedings as various characters appear to play their part in the unfolding drama, or else, if the actor is already on the stage as a member of the Chorus, he or she simply adopts the character now required to speak. Hence Ismene, Euridike, Haimon, Teiresias and the watchman are all at other times members of the Chorus, and even Antigone herself becomes the messenger reporting her own death at the end. This constant adopting of roles, as if putting on clothes before our eyes, intensifies the drama and increases the claustrophobia. There are long silences and measured gestures. Blurred shapes of people or landscapes appear in projections on the wall; a persistent barely musical beat thrums and fades - it hardly seems possible that such a device could still be utilised after having been so often misused elsewhere to generate bogus suspense, but here is is crushingly effective.

At the end, members of the Chorus have become ordinary people, tidying up, washing glasses, typing reports. The disk completes its arc, slowly returning to cover the sun-circle; once again light bleeds from around the edges as in an eclipse. Thebes is not yet at peace.