Elias Kapetanakis’s The Soiree, a play that challenged theatrical conventions in the late nineteenth century, premieres on Saturday 3 May at the Horos Theatre, directed by Sophia Marathaki. Inspired by the social custom of families calling on one another, it is a biting comedy of manners, full of dramatic twists, and a study of mores that gleefully exposes the laughable, petty bourgeois world of that – and every other – time. It is also, though, a lament for lost civility and a denunciation of hidden violence.

The Neroulos family receive an unexpected visit from Mr and Mrs Stenos, accompanied by their nephew, Nikos. He is a bachelor, who has long admired the Neroulos daughters on their promenades with other eligible young ladies of the town, and this is the perfect opportunity to get to know them better. Indeed, he hopes to make one of them his wife. However, hosts and guests are constantly at cross-purposes, the rules of good conduct are abandoned, and the evening is derailed, descending into comic chaos. Ignorance, hypocrisy, absurdity and slavish deference to all things foreign come to the surface, along with the aping of polite behaviour, empty rhetoric, and a veneer of respectability.

Having directed an extremely successful NTG production of Kapetanakis’s The General Secretary in 2017, Sophia Marathaki now takes on another of his works, one that he likened to a steamroller due to the relentlessness of its sardonic wit. The Soiree employs high parody and ridicule to show how entrapped its protagonists are by formality, etiquette and language (an amalgam of demotic Greek and old-fashioned katharevousa), while highlighting their flaws and imperfections. It also reveals – or rather confirms – how ludicrous and tragic they are and how suffocated by social obligations, while identifying the awkwardness and embarrassment that defines their entire milieu.

As the director notes, “The characters of The Soiree alleviate their boredom through flirtation, arguments, snubs and humour, ignoring the absolute void of their existence. Despite their unremitting foolishness, however, they are likeable and lively creatures, demonstrating a childish naivety and an inability to control their affect. Yet they are also dangerous because they are potentially violent, abusive, always on the verge of lashing out. They are children in the bodies of adults, just as we are today. Ignorant, irresponsible, complacent, and therefore deadly.”

In The Soiree, blunders, conflicts, songs, fights and outbursts mercilessly lay bare the desire that everyone has to play a part that isn’t theirs. Balancing farce and tragedy, it leads us to a mirror and with a knowing smile and self-deprecating humour, brings us face to face with our narrow lives; with our individual and collective identity.

The play belongs to the tradition of popular one-act comedies that flourished in the late nineteenth century. It was first performed in March 1894 by Dimitrios Kotopoulis’s troupe at the Comedy Theatre, just one year after the enormous success of The General Secretary. The Belle Epoque was an era of great changes, ostensibly characterised by optimism, but actually full of turmoil and fraught with unexpected developments. Greece had only recently – in December 1893 – declared bankruptcy, while in the theatre, operettas and romantic dramas dominated the stage. Kapetanakis made his brief foray into the theatre having accumulated a wealth of experience from his life in Athens and the provinces, as well as from his many professional pursuits. In just four plays, he had a profound impact on Greek theatre and decisively shaped its future course.

The production is part of a series of Modern Greek Plays at the National Theatre of Greece this season.