A Message from the Artistic Director
 

The National Theatre of Greec begins its new season by launching the dymanic network we announced last May. A network of practioners, audiences, ideas, and languages. The NTG is in dialogue with the crucial questions of our times, revisiting its past, reintroducing canonical plays, and presenting fresh productions that are bold and energetic, with a strong artistic stamp and an elevated aesthetic sensibility.

Its reach extends across boundaries, leaving a distinct and enduring mark on our cultural life.

Our wide-ranging programme spans the revitalised Ziller Building, the heart of the NTG, with its four performance spaces – the Main Stage, the Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage, the Plagia Skini and the Hall – and the other venues that will host our many and varied activities this year: the Dipylon Theatre for the Experimental Stage, the Maria Callas Olympia Municipal Music Theatre for the Children’s Stage, and the Kappa Theatre and the first floor of the Athens Municipal Gallery for the educational workshops of the Young People’s Stage.

We are announcing new ensembles, created through auditions, for all productions, mixing seasoned actors and performers with emerging talents. Meanwhile, we are expanding the scope of the Young People’s Stage – it is running more than 50 workshops and major social initiatives this year – and unveiling a renewed artistic profile for the Experimental Stage. We are keen to welcome both loyal theatregoers and newcomers not only to our theatres but also to the important parallel activities that accompany them – our Interdisciplinary Interartistic Dialogues, Salons of Language, and Short Festivals. In addition, we are introducing NTG online radio, refurbishing the café-bar, and bringing unique new items to our shop.

Our line-up features hit shows from last season alongside landmark works and classic plays, while we are also entering into co-productions and collaborations with creators and institutions from abroad, including the Pina Bausch Foundation and London’s Royal Court, amplifying theatre’s global presence through sustained and systematic outreach. At the same time, we are cultivating domestic partnerships with the Municipality of Athens and regional playhouses and organisations, among others.

 

Concurrently, we are embracing the investigative theatre of today, drawing together different fields and artforms, and consciously remaining open to diverse voices and perspectives of every kind. We are focusing on the exploration of contemporary Greek and international playwriting, delving into the language of the stage, and how creators with a distinctive identity and artistic vision think and work. We are fostering an imaginative and enquiring exchange of ideas that brings people together, relying on the dedication of everyone at the National Theatre of Greece, whatever their field. This is the achievement of all those who participate in shaping the broader theatrical community, who share a common vision for art – and therefore for life itself.

Our vehicle is language and the broader web it weaves. Every production is inspired by some aspect of language, entering into dialogue with the concepts and questions it poses. It threads together the themes across our entire programme, and links all our performance spaces and activities. This linguistic web is the essence of our philosophy.

Let us enjoy the exciting journey of understanding and experience that it will open up for us.

 

 And if “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world”, I say:

Let us expand our limits.

Argyro Chioti
 

* Ludwig Wittgenstein | “Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus”, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co, 1922.

 

 

SILVER TONGUE, HOLLOW VOICE

FAUST | Based on the play by Goethe – Directed by Aris Biniaris – Main Stage | Ziller Building | 2nd year | Opens 8 October

A psychological adventure exploring the boundless facets of one of the most fascinating characters in Western literature.
 

Following its enormous success last season, Aris Biniaris’s version of Goethe’s Faust returns with a new cast for a limited run on the Main Stage of the Ziller Building from 8 October. It is a psychological adventure, exploring the boundless facets of a hero who is still a symbol of human discovery, moral dilemmas, and existential torment; an extraordinary journey into the subconscious of one of the most fascinating characters in Western literature.

The tale of Faust is relocated to the present day in a production that immerses the audience in all those instincts, emotions and physical pleasures that the hero sacrifices in pursuit of intellectual enlightenment. He comes into contact with psychotherapy, delving into his hitherto unexplored unconscious. However, this journey reveals the dark undercurrents of his psyche, which he is forced to confront as the hidden forces dwelling there – buried desires, repressed instincts, fear, and guilt – come to the surface. And it is precisely this shadowy world, this reviled part of existence, that will lead him to attain the highest ideal and ultimate spirituality: love. But to do so, he must shine a light on every aspect of himself that he feels to be impure, on all his shame and inhibitions. Only then will he be able to face up to the greatest challenge of all: life itself.

From Goethe to Christopher Marlowe and the Marquis de Sade, from Freud to Jung, Aris Biniaris’s Faust is a production of intense musicality about the fierce conflict between the body and the spirit, experience and knowledge, and the Apollonian and the Dionysian, as well as the agonising attempt to find meaning in existence and seek redemption.

Translation: Ioannis N. Theodorakopoulos
Adaptation, Direction: Aris Biniaris
Dramaturgical advisor: Nefeli Papanastasopoulou
Set, Costumes, Masks: Paris Mexis
Music, Sound design: Jeph Vanger
Choreography: Faidra Daioglou
Lighting: Stella Kaltsou
Vocal compositions: Marissa Bili
Production dramaturg: Erie Kyrgia
Directing assistant: Gelly Pedefu
Set and costume design assistants: Marianthi Radou, Despoina Maria Zachariou
Lighting design assistant: Ifigeneia Gianniou
Make-up design: Olga Faleichyk
Hair design: Konstantinos Koliousis

Cast (in alphabetical order): Katerina Amplianiti, Haris Fragoulis, Babis Galiatsatos, Alexandra Hasani, Ilektra Kartanou, Eirini Katsinoula, Nadia Katsoura, Andreas Kontopoulos, Marios Kritikopoulos, Maria Manta, Ioanna Mavrea, Vasilis Papadopoulos, Stefanos Pittas, Konstantina Takalou, Eirini Tsellou

Photos & videos: Christos Symeonidis

Venue: Ziller Building | Main Stage
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 6pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 9pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday Premium Seats €20, Zone A €17, Zone B €15, Zone C €10, Friday General Admission €14, Saturday & Sunday Premium Seats €25, Zone A €22, Zone B €18, Zone C €10 | Students/Young people (up to 28 years): €12, Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursdays to Sunday €14, Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5, Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10

Running time: 90 minutes

The production is not recommended for under-16s.

 

NO BONES HAS THE TONGUE THOUGH IT CRUSHES THEM

 

CARYATID! by Giorgos Kapoutzidis – Directed by Katerina Mavrogeorgi – Kappa Theatre | 2nd year | Opens 8 October

The satirical comedy returns in October - more savage than ever!

Following its enormous success last season, Giorgos Kapoutzidis’ coruscating Caryatid!, directed by Katerina Mavrogeorgi, returns on Wednesday 8 October to a new venue, Kappa Theatre. Caryatid! is a subversive comedy set in present-day Greece, about this long-suffering country’s remarkable tendency to get caught up in situations that quickly spiral out of control.

In about half an hour, the long-awaited press conference will finally take place. Reporters’ trembling fingers hover over the record button on their cameras. Prepared speeches and heartfelt expressions are rehearsed repeatedly; because even experienced politicians are feeling nervous today. Today we are all brothers; today we are all one.

Today, after decades of captivity in the British Museum, the ethereal Caryatid, the long-lost sixth sister, the shimmering symbol of an entire civilisation, is to return to Greece! The whole country is on tenterhooks waiting for her arrival, as if she were a best friend, aunt, or long-lost cousin from abroad. Her reception, however, will not be what we imagined, planned for and dreamed of. Not by a long chalk. The appearance of the Caryatid in her mother country is a tragicomedy. Hilarious, but merciless.

Caryatid! was commissioned from the author as part of a series of Modern Greek Plays at the National Theatre of Greece in the 2024-25 season.

Director: Katerina Mavrogeorgi
Dramaturgical advisor, Artistic associate: Antonis Antonopoulos
Set design: Artemis Flessa
Costume design: Ifigeneia Daoudaki
Music: Panagiotis Melidis (Larry Gus)
Movement: Sofia Paschou
Lighting design: Vasia Attarian
Video design: Tassos Gkoletsos
Production dramaturg: Vivi Spathoula
Directing assistant: Sofia Stathatou
Set design assistant: Aggeliki Vassiliopoulou-Kampitsi
Costume design assistant: Alexandra-Anastasia Ftouli
Lighting design assistant: Serafeim Radis
Second directing assistant: Corine Vezirgianni
Make-up design: Olga Faleichyk
Hair design, Wigs: Konstantinos Koliousis

Cast (in alphabetical order): Asimina Anastasopoulou, Maria Filini, Stelios Iakovidis, Sotiris Manikas, Agoritsa Oikonomou, Drosos Skotis, Stelios Xanthoudakis
 

Photographs: Elina Giounanli
Video: Patroklos Skafidas

Venue: Kappa Theatre (Kypselis 2, Athens)
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 7pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 9pm

Ticket prices: General admission: €25. Students/Young people (up to 28 years): 14€. Over 65s: €15. Unemployed (Wednesday to Friday) €8. Parents of large families (Polyteknoi): €10. Disabled & companion: €5.

 

 

THE EXISTENTIAL LANGUAGE

 

THREE SISTERS by Anton Chekhov – Directed by Maria Magkanari – Plagia Skini | Ziller Building | 2nd year | Opens 15 October

A play about the search for a Moscow that is always just out of reach.
 

On 15 October, Anton Chekhov's masterpiece Three sisters, directed by Maria Magkanari, returns with its superb cast for a second year to the Plagia Skini of the Ziller Building. It is a play about people who long to become a better version of themselves but lack the courage to do so. It explores expectation, time and memory, but most of all the search for a Moscow that is always just out of reach.

Three sisters – a single generation in a single family. Three women united by the closest of kinships, but doomed to live separate lives. As the eldest, Olga will always dwell in the past. Masha, the middle sibling, will commit herself to the present. And Irina, the youngest, will dream of the future.

In Chekhov's hands, daily social rituals, birthdays and anniversaries, philosophical discussions and plans, births and disasters, love and rejection, arrivals and departures, and above all, disappointment, are crafted into a precious, often enigmatic play, which leads his characters with underlying humour from extreme joy to utter despair.

This is not the first time that Maria Magkanari has tackled the great Russian dramatist, unlocking the riddles of an emblematic work that for more than a century has served as a perfect metaphor for talking about time. Three sisters is a mosaic of elusive meaningfulness, of moments in our lives that failed to be glorious, successful, or redemptive. But it also stands as a monument to Chekhov's love of humanity.

The three sisters will never stop speaking – even in silence – about desires that have been buried or forgotten; about men who say they love their wives and women who are constantly yearning; about broken clocks and lives left unfulfilled; about all the vitality that is silently suffocated by indolence; about daily household rituals steeped in silence; about infectious tears and laughter; about the confusion felt by those searching for meaning; about the self-deception that holds us all captive; and about the path traced by rivers of tears to explosive joy; in short, about life.

Three sisters has been staged twice by the National Theatre of Greece: in 1951, directed by Karolos Koun, and in 1982, directed by Michael Cacoyannis. Both productions were presented on the main stage of the Ziller Building.

Translation: Giorgos P. Depastas & Alexandros Isaris
Director: Maria Magkanari
Dramaturgical advisor: Sophia Eftychiadou
Set design: Filanthi Bougatsou
Costume design: Pavlos Thanopoulos
Music: Haralambos Gogios
Movement: Cecile Mikroutsikou
Lighting: Maria Gozadinou
Production dramaturg: Eva Saraga
Directing assistants: Eleni Pappa, Andriana Chalkidi
Set design assistant: Natasa Lekkou
Costume design assistant: Antonia Michaliou
Second directing assistant: Yakinthi Vouleli  
Make-up design: Olga Faleichyk
Hair design: Konstantinos Koliousis

The cast (in alphabetical order): Andriana Chalkidi, Thanassis Dimou, Nikolos Douros, Maria Georgiadou, Antonis Gritsis, Amalia Kavali, Giannis Klinis, Kostas Koronaios, Andreas Natsios, Nancy Sideri, Maria Skoula, Thaleia Sykioti, Giorgis Tsampourakis, Tryfonas Zacharis

Photographs: Maria Toultsa

Video: Nikos Pastras

Venue: Ziller Building | Plagia Skini
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 9pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 6pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday €17, Friday €14, Saturday & Sunday €22. Students/Young people (up to 28 years) €12. Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursday to Sunday €14. Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5. Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10

Running time: 130 minutes
 

HER LANGUAGE

 

THE YOUNG PEOPLE’S STAGE | CHILDREN’S STAGE
ALICE’S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND based on the story by Lewis Carroll – Directed by Georgia Mavragani – Maria Callas Olympia Municipal Music Theatre | Opens 22 October

A journey of freedom and imagination, a dive by every Alice, whether young or old, big or small, into the land of dreams.

From October 22, the NTG’s Children’s Stage, taking up residence this season in the historic Maria Callas Olympia Municipal Musical Theatre, presents Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. This dreamlike production of Lewis Carroll’s masterpiece – in a bold new adaptation by director Georgia Mavragani and with original music and poetry by Lena Platonos – is sure to delight audiences of all ages.

It perfectly captures the spirit of a classic work that occupies a space between fantasy and reality, bringing to life Alice’s journey into the unknown in a modern celebration of the beauty of transformation performed by an ensemble cast. It is a play made from the stuff of dreams for every Alice – young or old – who is searching for her true voice.

What might happen when your imagination runs faster than a white rabbit in a waistcoat with a watch?

One hot, lazy, summer afternoon – one of those when the grown-ups are always talking to each other – a little girl called Alice is sitting by the river. She is a child just like you. She questions, explores, and dares to step into the unknown, just like every child growing up. When Alice closes her eyes for just a moment, she suddenly finds herself tumbling down a deep rabbit hole that takes her to Wonderland. It is a place where grown-up logic no longer applies. Animals talk, people and things constantly change size and shape, and tears become a lake to swim and play in. There is wisdom in the words of the mad and absurdity in the words of the sane, and kings and queens crumple up like paper figures. And you, together with all the Alices, will dive into a land of dreams, summoning up all your courage and all your might to blow the paper figures away. And when the journey is over, you and Alice will know its true secret!

And Alice fell and fell
And Alice fell and fell
“I must be near the centre of the Earth”
And Alice fell and fell
“But how far have I fallen?”
And Alice fell and fell
“Could I come out the other side?”
And Alice fell and fell
“How do they walk there? Upside down?”

Translation: Pavlina Pampoudi
Adaptation, Director: Georgia Mavragani
Music: Lena Platonos
Set design: Artemis Flessa
Costume design: Lily Kyrili & Artemis Flessa
Movement: Marianna Kavallieratos
Lighting design: Tasos Palaioroutas
Sound design: Stergios Tsirliagkos
Masks: Martha Foka
Production dramaturg: Maria Karananou
First directing assistant: Constantina Kaltsiou
Second directing assistant: Maria Iliadi
Set and costume design assistant: Aggeliki Vassiliopoulou-Kampitsi

Cast (in alphabetical order): Evdoxia Androulidaki, Georgina Chryskioti, Giorgos Dermentzidis, Agni Karvountzi, Melina Kotselou, Nikos Manesis, Marina Papoulia, Giorgos Skarlatos, Anastasia Slafkidou, Jason Stasinos, Georgina Tatsi, Stellina Vogiatzi

Photos & videos: Christos Symeonidis

Venue: Maria Callas Olympia Municipal Music Theatre
Days and times of performances: Sundays at 11.30am and 3pm
Ticket prices: Adults €12, Children €10, Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5, Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10
 

Tickets go on sale on 1 October.

 

NOVEMBER 

FIRST LANGUAGE

COW | DEER by Katie Mitchell, Nina Segal and Melanie Wilson – Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage | Ziller Building | Opens 7 November | A co-production between the National Theatre of Greece and the Royal Court Theatre

Wind in tall trees. White sky. Rain soon. Hooves on earth. Twigs. Snap. Wait. Listen.
 

In this first collaboration with the Royal Court Theatre, the National Theatre of Greece presents Cow | Deer, a groundbreaking play by Katie Mitchell, Nina Segal and Melanie Wilson. Following its triumphant premiere in London on 3 September with a British cast, the production comes to the Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage with a four-member Greek ensemble, inviting audiences to a unique experience of listening to and exploring the “more-than-human world”. The director of the Greek version is Irene Fanarioti.

Cow | Deer is an otherworldly stage experience. A quartet of Greek performers and musicians evoke the lives of two animals, a cow and a deer, with no words, only sound. It is an experiment in reorientation: from speech to listening, from hierarchy to cooperation, from the purely human to the broader, multifaceted world of nature.

Initiating a new dialogue between theatre, nature and sound, Cow | Deer transcends human narratives about the climate crisis and focuses on the environment itself: animals, insects and elements of nature are no longer the backdrop to our lives, but equal participants in a fragile ecosystem. Through live Foley effects combined with authentic recordings of natural environments, the performers create an immersive soundscape in real time. The show unfolds without words and with sound as the central narrator – an experience that allows audiences to hear the world as an animal perceives it and experience a unique closeness to nature.

Cow | Deer is a cry of anguish for the environment. Every sound – a breath, a car, the barking of a dog or the chirping of a bird – becomes a reminder that survival is a shared responsibility of all species and not the exclusive privilege of human beings. It is a production that invites us to reconsider our place in the world – not as overlords but as fellow inhabitants of the Earth who exist with respect and care for one another.

 

Conceived and created by Katie Mitchell, Nina Segal, Melanie Wilson
Associate director for Greece: Irene Fanarioti
Foley consultants & Foley score: Ruth Sullivan, Tom Espiner
Designer: Alex Eales
Lighting designer: Prema Mehta
Assistant to the designer for Greece: Stavroula Papapostolou
Production dramaturg: Eva Saraga

Cast (in alphabetical order): Korina Kokkali, Christos Thanos, Joanna Toumpakari, Alexandros Zotaj

Venue: Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 7pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 8.30pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday €17, Friday €14, Saturday & Sunday €22. Students/Young people (up to 28 years) €12. Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursday to Sunday €14. Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5. Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10

 

DECEMBER

A LANGUAGE FOR LIVING

 

KONTAKTHOF by Pina Bausch – Main Stage | Ziller Building | Opens 17 December | A collaboration between the National Theatre of Greece and the Pina Bausch Foundation

A unique revival with an all-Greek ensemble.

From 17 December, The National Theatre of Greece presents Kontakthof, one of the most iconic works by the great choreographer Pina Bausch, in a joint production with the Pina Bausch Foundation. It was first performed in Greece at the Odeon of Hreodes Atticus in September 1988 by the Tanztheater Wuppertal. 

The artistic directors of this revival are Josephine Ann Endicott, a member of the original 1978 cast – and Pina’s longtime assistant – and Daphnis Kokkinos, a member of the Tanztheater Wuppertal and assistant to Pina since 1993.  The Foundation’s rehearsal directors for the production are Anne Martin – also a member of the original cast – and Scott Jennings. Kontakthof will be presented on the Main Stage of the Ziller Building by 23 exceptional Greek performers aged 21 to 55, who have been selected especially for this production.

Kontakthof premiered in 1978 at the Wuppertal Opera House. It is a milestone in Bausch’s early career and a key example of her collaboration with the set and costume designer Rolf Borzik, who shaped the company’s visual language during those defining years. The piece tours to this day, often performed by different generations. in 2000 it was “With Ladies and Gentlemen over 65” and in 2008 by teenagers aged 14 to 18 – each time posing anew the question of what “contact” means at various ages.

 “Kontakthof is a place where people meet who are searching for contact”, said Pina Bausch. “To show yourself, to deny yourself. With fears. Desire. Disappointments. Desperation. First Experiences. First attempts. Tenderness and what arises from it was an important theme in the work. [...] To show something of yourself, to overcome yourself." She herself, after all, was not interested in “how people move but what moves them” – emotions, desire, insecurity, the need for communication, loneliness.

As Endicott and Kokkinos, say, “What stands the test of time in Pina Bausch’s Kontakthof is the presence of people and their everyday lives on stage, revealing their desires, their insecurities, their longing for intimacy and love.”

Original production credits

Director & Choreographer: Pina Bausch
Collaboration: Rolf Borzik, Marion Cito, Hans Pop
Set design & costumes: Rolf Borzik
Music: Charlie Chaplin, Anton Karas, Juan Llossas, Nino Rota, Jean Sibelius etc.

World premiere: 9 December 1978, Wuppertal Opera House

Original cast: Arnaldo Alvarez, Elisabeth Clarke, Fernando Cortizo, Gary Austin Crocker, Mari Di Lena, Josephine Ann Endicott, Lutz Förster, John Giffin, Silvia Kesselheim, Ed Kortlandt, Luis P. Layag, Beatrice Libonati, Anne Martin, Jan Minarik, Vivienne Newport, Arthur Rosenfeld, Monika Sagon, Heinz Samm, Meryl Tankard, Christian Trouillas

Credits for the National Theatre of Greece

Artistic directors: Josephine Ann Endicott, Daphnis Kokkinos

Rehearsal directors: Scott Jennings, Anne Martin
Set design adaptation: Gerburg Stoffel
Costume adaptation: Petra Leidner
Lighting adaptation: Jo Verlei
Sound consultant: Karsten Fischer
Costume adaptation associate: Pavlos Thanopoulos
Production dramaturg: Erie Kyrgia

The translations of the performance texts into Greek are by Giorgos Depastas.

Performance rights: Verlag der Autoren, Frankfurt am Main representing the Pina Bausch Foundation, Wuppertal.

Performers (in alphabetical order): Thanassis Akokkalidis, Ioannis Bastas, Marilena Dara, Daphne Drakopoulou, Dimitris Georgiadis, Katerina Gevetzi, Natalia Kalogeropoulou, Dimitris Kollios, Melina Konti, Konstantinos Kontogeorgopoulos, Nikos Kousoulis, Nikos Lekakis, Eri Magkou, Dimitris Mandrinos, Alexandra Ospici, Evini Pantelaki, Elsa Siskou, Vassiana Skopetea, Sania Stribakou, Pyrros Theofanopoulos, Alexandros Vardaxoglou, Vicky Volioti, Nikos Ziaziaris

Photographs: Karol Jarek
Video: Nikos Pastras

Venue: Main Stage | Ziller Building
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 5pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 8pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday Premium Seats €20, Zone A €17, Zone B €15, Zone C €10, Friday General Admission €14, Saturday & Sunday Premium Seats €25, Zone A €22, Zone B €18, Zone C €10 | Students/Young people (up to 28 years): €12, Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursday to Sunday €14, Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5, Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10

Running time: 2 hours and 50 minutes (with interval)

 

JANUARY 

A UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE

SACRED by Guillaume Poix | from an idea by Lorraine de Sagazan – Directed by Hristos Theodoridis – Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage | Ziller Building | Opens 28 January

“It's not what we have lived, it's what we have left to live. And I will be able to visualise this moment forever. I will be able to love you tomorrow forever.”
 

Drawing inspiration from 300 interviews taken in 2020 and 2021 during lockdown, Guillaume Poix’s Sacred (Un Sacre) weaves together small stories of individuals in a chronicle of loss that culminates in the great history of humankind. A history that now seems to be unfolding in ways we cannot keep up with. A history that is marked by other significant deaths: of dignity, rights, empathy, and justice.

“It is difficult for things to end. It would be nice, so nice if they never ended.” Eleven people in a strange encounter at a moment in time somewhere in the world.

“I wanted to have a life, not be a story.” Stories of the deaths of people who were passionately loved, of people who sacrificed themselves for others, of people who travelled to a far-off country for a better future, of people who were mourned and people who no one missed. Stories apparently unrelated but united by the core that burns constantly throughout human history: our merciless mortality. “Pain takes time. Pain endures within us.” In an era when death goes unnoticed – if it is not met with outright indifference, when loss must be experienced quickly and pain is not permitted because it tarnishes the false happiness of a life that is constantly on display, Guillaume Poix reminds us that the end of life is a natural part of it.

Sacred, directed by Hristos Theodoridis, will follow the logic of the author’s interview-based approach, adding three new stories inspired by the situation in Greece in recent years, written by the director’s regular collaborator, Isabella Konstantinidou. With live on-stage music and movement by Xenia Themeli filling or magnifying the gaps left by speech, this will be a parade of humanness, a celebration of life.

Because all you can do in the world we have made is keep on existing. Existence as revolution, then.

Translation: Dimitra Kondylaki
Adaptation: Hristos Theodoridis, Isabella Konstantinidou
Direction & musical supervision: Hristos Theodoridis
Set design: Loukas Bakas, Filanthi Bougatsou
Costume design: Angelos Mentis
Choreography: Xenia Themeli
Lighting design: Tasos Palaioroutas
Music coach: Melina Peonidou
Production dramaturg: Eva Saraga
Directing assistant: Iasonas Asimakopoulos

Cast (in alphabetical order): Eleftheria Angelitsa, Charalampos Athanasopoulos, Eirini Dampasi, Giorgos Exakoidis, Giorgos Kissandrakis, Konstantinos Krommydas, Thanos Magklaras, Ioanna Mavrea, Christos Tzon Mouslli, Maria Bagana, Andreas Natsios, Elias Sgouralis, Thomas Tsaknakis

Venue: Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage | Ziller Building
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 7pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 8.30pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday €17, Friday €14, Saturday & Sunday €22. Students/Young people (up to 28 years) €12. Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursday to Sunday €14. Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5. Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10.

 

THE LANGUAGE OF TODAY

THE YOUNG PEOPLE’S STAGE | THE YOUTH STAGE
YOU HAVE FIVE MINUTES by Katerina Louvari Fasoi – Directed by Pantelis Dentakis – Plagia Skini | Ziller Building | 
Opens 28 January
 

 “I can’t sleep. Only dreams, no sleep.”
 Franz Kafka, 21 July 1913

Teenagers in a sports team try to find their own voice, their own identity, to embrace their fears and their weaknesses. They are young people forced to grow up prematurely to defend their existence, their dreams sometimes silent and sometimes articulated, but always surprising. They are limited and defined by an entire system of control. But what would happen if that system were to listen to them? Would it collapse or reinvent itself, establishing new norms and goals? What would life be like the day after?

The arrival of a new member to the team creates fragile new balances, upsetting those that already exist, while at the same time exposing the cracks in the characters and their relationships. Meanwhile, their coach tries to lead them to the very top – often at any cost. Will he succeed? Will they all succeed together, as a whole?

The characters – apart from the coach – are not just athletes, though; they are also adolescents. Their minds are restless and tireless, incessantly inquisitive and questioning even what is self-evident, challenging everything that happens, even when it takes place right before their eyes. For teenagers, nothing can be taken for granted and anything can go into freefall at any moment. The pivotal period that is adolescence, despite its mishaps, is nonetheless a great gift: a second chance before the harsh realities of adult life set in. To grab life by the hair and explore every kind of limit to the fullest!

You have five minutes is about this exploration, about the dreams within us and the dreams that others have for us, which we unwittingly adopt, about our fears, and even our nightmares. It talks about that moment of the day or night when we dare to take control and start learning life anew. It is a moment of absolute freedom for each of us.

*The production takes its inspiration from the (sleeping and waking) dreams of young NTG workshop participants who generously shared them with the writer.

*Both during rehearsals and performances, the director, cast and crew will be in close contact and in open dialogue with the NTG workshop accompanying the entire process. The common goal of the performance and the workshop is interaction prompted by sleeping and waking dreams, as well as the language of dreams in general.

Director: Pantelis Dentakis
Set design: Katerina Vlahbey
Costume design: Dimitra Liakoura
Music: Alexandra Katerinopoulou
Movement: Theano Xydia
Lighting & Video: Apostolis Koutsianikoulis
Production dramaturg: Eftichia Charalambaki
Directing assistant: Katerina Louvari Fasoi

Cast (in alphabetical order): Yiannis Baritakis, Afroditi Kapokaki, Stavros Karagiannis, Penelope Markopoulou, Danai Omoregkie Neanthi, Penny Papageorgiou, Minos Theocharis

Venue: Plagia Skini  | Ziller Building
Days and times of performances: Saturdays at 6pm and Sundays at 8pm
Ticket prices: General admission €10. Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5.

 

FEBRUARY

LANGUAGE AS NOSTALGIA

 

THE CHERRY ORCHARD by Anton Chekhov – Directed by Ektoras Lygizos – Main Stage | Ziller Building | Opens 26 February

After many years, a group of relatives come together in their now-aging – and mortgaged – home. Deep down, they all know that this is their last chance to feel the sense of familiarity that unites them, but also to say goodbye to everything that seems already to belong to the past even as they are experiencing it.

Chekhov’s last play, written just a few months before his death, speaks with painful insouciance about a carefree present that is suffocatingly squashed between a rose-tinted past and a tragically uncertain future. The owners of the cherry orchard, drowning in debt and delusion, refuse to accept that their estate is lost and that the dramatically changing world has passed them by. Like all the play’s characters, more or less, they choose to cling to the light-heartedness of an eternal childhood, stubbornly postponing their adulthood.

The relationship of human beings with loss, with the relentless passage of time, and their inability to perceive reality in the round are the central themes of this hilarious and at the same time heartbreaking tragicomedy, over which terror – of the abyss and the infinite – constantly looms.

Chekhov’s apparently realistic speech and – by extension – world is essentially a complex, almost maximalist verbal and aural universe where banal everyday conversations, profound reflections, secret thoughts, feverish inner monologues, poems and songs, incomprehensible mutterings, and reassuringly familiar but menacingly alien sounds of the natural environment coexist in enviable harmony.

Using Chrysa Prokopaki’s superb translation and setting the action entirely in the drawing room and conservatory of a Russian dacha, Ektoras Lygizos’s adaptation treats Chekhov’s swan song as an ensemble piece. In a peculiar kind of “musical realism” – where the score is the text and the musical instruments human voices – the 11 cast members bring to life a group of people who, through their words and actions, fight to exorcise the silence and the emptiness that threaten at every moment to annihilate them.

This is the third time that The Cherry Orchard has been performed on the Main Stage of the National Theatre, 41 years after the production directed by Giorgos Michailidis and 58 years after that of Takis Mouzenidis.

Translation: Chrysa Prokopaki
Adaptation, Direction: Ektoras Lygizos
Set design: Myrto Lambrou
Costume design: Alkisti Mamali
Musical adaptation and coaching: Lina Zachari
Movement collaboration, Choreography: Dimitris Mytilinaios
Lighting design: Dimitris Kasimatis
Sound design: Brian Coon
Production dramaturg: Erie Kyrgia
Directing assistant: Eva Vlassopoulou
Make-up and hair design: Ioanna Lygizou
Set design assistant: Anna Biza

Cast (in alphabetical order): Giannis Klinis, Sofia Kokkali, Ektoras Lygizos, Ivonni Maltezou*, Maria Moschouri, Amalia Moutoussi, Rania Oikonomidou*, Giannis Papadopoulos, Katerina Patsiani, Fivos Simeonidis, Giorgos Ziakas

* Double cast

Venue: Main Stage | Ziller Building
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 5pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 8pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday Premium Seats €20, Zone A €17, Zone B €15, Zone C €10, Friday General Admission €14, Saturday & Sunday Premium Seats €25, Zone A €22, Zone B €18, Zone C €10 | Students/Young people (up to 28 years): €12, Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursday to Sunday €14, Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5, Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10

 

THE LANGUAGE OF DECENTRALISATION

OMEGA STATION by Giorgos Christodoulou –  Directed by Dimitris Tsikouras (Tsik) | On tour from February | Plagia Skini | Ziller Building | Opens 6 May

A production about loss, complicity and forgiveness, inspired by the last book of the Iliad, visits Greece’s regions and remote islands.

The National Theatre of Greece presents Omega Station: a new Greek play written by Giorgos Christodoulou and directed by Dimitris Tsikouras (Tsik), a top graduate of the NTG Drama School Directing Department last year. Focusing on society’s ideas about violence, silence, diversity, complicity and forgiveness, this production, with its adaptable staging possibilities, is one of the network-building initiatives of the NTG, which is attempting – in collaboration with regional theatres, municipalities, and other local bodies – to take artistic creation beyond the narrow confines of the urban centre, to regional towns and remote islands, and to cultivate the Language of Decentralisation. The production will complete its run in the spring of 2026, at the Plagia Skini of the Ziller Building.

The play draws inspiration from the final book of the Iliad, when King Priam kneels before Achilles and pleads with him for the return of his son’s body. From this ancient core, a contemporary narrative is born that revolves around collective complicity, loss, the need for catharsis – but also the crucial act of forgiveness.

In a Greek village, a young man – viewed as somehow different by the local community – disappears. His father faces loss, impenetrable silence, homophobic violence cloaked in normality, and ultimately himself. He stands before the person who has deprived him of his child, demanding to know the truth, demanding a body that is missing. Five characters meet on stage and, with a crime as their starting point, open up a shared space for storytelling, questioning and confrontation. Through myths, allegories and a variety of expressive means, they attempt to get to the heart of the human condition and search for the meaning of true forgiveness.

 Director: Dimitris Tsikouras (Tsik)
 Dramaturgical advisor: Aristi Tselou
 Set design: Yannis Theodorakis
 Costume design: Alexandra Stamati
 Music: George Stefanakidis
 Lighting design: Christina Thanasoula
 Production dramaturg: Eftichia Charalambaki
 Directing assistant: Xenia Tabourlou
 Set design assistant: Maria Enislidou

Cast (in alphabetical order): Alexandra Hasani, Zoe Kousana, Panagiotis Panteras, Stefanos Pittas, Dimitris Tsikouras (Tsik)

Venue: From February | Regional Tour & | From 6 May | Plagia Skini | Ziller Building
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 9pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 6pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday €17, Friday €14, Saturday & Sunday €22. Students/Young people (up to 28 years) €12. Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursday to Sunday €14. Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5. Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10.

 

APRIL

 

I’LL RIP OUT YOUR TONGUE

 

DOLL based on A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen – Directed by Maria Panourgia – Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage | Opens 1 April

What makes life worth living?

“For women, only one standard of female beauty is sanctioned: the girl.” This phrase of Susan Sontag’s encapsulates the autonomy-denying image of women as objects. In Bunraku, a type of Japanese puppet theatre, “in plays with supernatural themes, a puppet may be constructed so that its face can quickly transform into that of a demon.”

These two phrases inspire the title and content of Doll, which is based on Ibsen’s A Doll’s House. Undeniably relevant even today, the great Norwegian dramatist’s work highlights how women in male-dominated societies all over the world are looked down on and manipulated. It is striking how little conditions for women have changed since 1879, when the play – groundbreaking for its time – was written.

At the heart of this dark and insidiously violent work is a married couple bound by an unequal sexual relationship and a pervasive sense of financial insecurity — and between them, a secret. When it is revealed, the ensuing conflict brings to the surface deep existential questions that can be answered neither through reason nor instinct. The play takes on a mythical – almost metaphysical – dimension, because these are issues that remain unresolved to this day. At the end, Nora transforms from a doll into a demon not because she is the embodiment of evil, but because she claims the choice and responsibility that freedom demands. The final rupture is not merely a departure from the house. It is an explosion!

A Doll’s House takes place in a living room around Christmas. The interior of the house is glimpsed through windows and half-open doors, as if it is being observed from outside. The action slips in and out of view behind the walls of the set, rupturing realism and, through concealment, revealing the dark aspects, awkward pauses, cruel actions and bold words of the characters.

The family’s children live mainly outside the world of adults, beyond the confines of the house, which they watch, desire, and fear, sometimes quiet and otherworldly, and sometimes hyperactive and talkative. The nanny looks after the children as if they are pets; the moneylender becomes a catalyst for the truth to be revealed; the doctor, who is also the only friend of the family, is terminally ill; an acquaintance from the past suddenly intrudes, asking for protection. Meanwhile, the husband is constantly calculating numbers, counting money, and checking Nora’s weight. Nora, in turn, eats incessantly and her emotional hunger grows into something intense and uncontrollable.

Christmas and life in the house are stripped of anything spiritual. Money rules supreme and determines people’s fate and their relationships. Everyone is praying for salvation to the one true god, mammon. Nora does not fall apart merely to piece herself back together again, but to claim the right to dream of a better world. To answer the question: “What makes life worth living?”

Translation: Giorgos Depastas
Adaptation, direction: Maria Panourgia
Dramaturgical advisor: Antonis Antonopoulos
Set design: Poulcheria Tzova & Maria Panourgia
Costume design: Ioanna Tsami
Music: Georgos Mizithras
Movement: Zoe Hatziantoniou
Lighting design: Dimitris Kasimatis
Production dramaturg: Eva Saraga
Directing assistant: Georgia Kanellopoulou

Cast (in alphabetical order): Babis Galiatsatos, Eleana Georgouli, Despina Karagianni, Marina Malliou, Christiana Matelska Toka, Katerina Papadaki, Fidel Talampoukas, Aineias Tsamatis, Stella Vogiatzaki

Venue: Nikos Kourkoulos New Stage
Days and times of performances: Wednesdays & Sundays at 7pm | Thursdays, Fridays & Saturdays at 8.30pm
Ticket prices: Wednesday & Thursday €17, Friday €14, Saturday & Sunday €22. Students/Young people (up to 28 years) €12. Over 65s: Wednesday €12, Thursday to Sunday €14. Unemployed, Disabled & companion €5. Parents of large families (Polyteknoi) €10.
 

Experimental Stage – Dipylon Theatre
Heads: Akilas Karazisis & Nefeli Maistrali

“Don’t be afraid. It’s theatre.”

"Fear of what's going to happen isn't a problem. It's the start of improvisation."
John Cale 
 

The National Theatre of Greece’s Experimental Stage moves to the ground floor of the Dipylon Theatre to launch a vibrant new artistic meeting place, foregrounding the process of creation, rehearsal, and theatrical experimentation. This year, the Experimental Stage is shifting its focus from the final artistic result – and the limitations imposed by time – to the genesis of a production. Through the lively interaction of creators and audiences, it emphasises what theatre brings into being in the here and now, always grounded in collaboration, equality, and a sense of shared responsibility. It takes a three-pronged approach:
 

1. Ensemble – A group of actors

Through an audition process, a 16-member ensemble of actors has been put together, working collectively to cultivate a culture of collaboration, experimentation and artistic continuity that will last throughout the year. Freed from the usual obligation to come up with a finished product, the ensemble is encouraged to create material in a climate of exploration, rehearsal and discovery.

2. Ongoing Open Rehearsal | From 8 October

The Ongoing Rehearsal entitled Kaputt / War, a Vaudeville, will have its doors open throughout the year. Every Wednesday and Thursday, from 6pm to 10pm, the public will have the opportunity to watch a live creation – not a performance – that is in perpetual motion and evolution. Payment of a nominal fee entitles visitors to stay for as long as they wish – from 4 minutes to 4 hours. On stage, the ensemble will narrate, sing, dance, and act, drawing on theatrical, literary and musical sources. The Open Rehearsal will revolve around Curzio Malaparte’s novel Kaputt and other related material related to the theme of War.

Tickets go on sale on 1 October.

3. Six theatrical sketches

Six artists from different fields (theatre, dance, music, and performance) will work together with the ensemble, creating six “sketches” inspired by the theme of the National Theatre of Greece’s 2025-26 Artistic Programme, Language. Their aim will be to engage in an equal, honest and creative dialogue with the group.

Sketch 1 | The language of manifestos
Journey to Shatila
31 October

The performance aims to combine testimony, recollection, poetry, and political manifesto. The juxtaposition of a landscape of brightness with a landscape of ash.
 

Conceived and created by  Alexandra Kazazou
Set & costumes: Magdalini Avgerinou
Lighting: Semina Papalexandropoulou
Production dramaturg: Eftychia Charalampaki
Directing assistant: Kostis Glykantzis

Performers (in alphabetical order): Giannis Varsos, Titos Grigoropoulos, Vasilis Karaboulas, Katerina Kristo, Giorgos Matziaris,  Nefeli Padermali, Vivi Petsi, Thaleia Stamatelou
 

Sketch 2 | The language of walls
Poetry is on the streets
5 December

An urgent form of communication: symbols, slogans and images written in haste, erased, and rewritten. A language that invades the public sphere and encroaches on the private, giving meaning to empty space and to every snapshot taken through the window of a city bus.

Conceived and created by Theano Metaxa
Set & costumes: Konstantinos Skourletis
Lighting: Semina Papalexandropoulou
Production dramaturg: Magda Stergiou
Directing assistant: Grigoris Sfakianakis

Cast (in alphabetical order): Elissaios Vlachos, Theodora Georgakopoulou, Dimitris Kapetanios, Kondylia Konstantelaki, Anna Louizidi, Thomas Makrigiannis, Wichi, Tatiana-Anna Pitta

 

Latest updated: 18/11/2025