Amen ** (2 stars) Fotis Nikolaou

Reviewed on Monday 13 of October

The first image that appears in my mind when I remember this show is a sandwich made with very tasty gourmet bread cut in half and spread with a bit of mayo (I hate mayo). This show could be dissected and left over with the beginning and the end and throw away almost everything in between, but wait, let me think, then you would not have a show!

Six dancers all of them very good, 2 actors one of the most horrible ones I’ve seen (take your earplugs if you appreciate your ability to hear) and a little person witch is neither one or the other, but with a lot of charisma in her self. The choreography by moments seems to be inexistent and the performers look like they where improvising, the music is heavy, tedious and repetitive without a reason for it; witch gives to the whole performance a very pretentious look.

Didn’t understand a thing. The set is a sort of clothing warehouse and the worst part of it is that you can not comfortably sleep it off because there are only three rows of chairs and the performers are right in front of you.

Has all of the poetic clichés that could be used in a show, a music box, and music coming from some old transistors, etc. Things that we have seen used on stage millions of times and in a more clever way.

To wrap it up, there are not a lot of things to be said. Its not a hit its not a miss but somewhere in between.

Go at your own risk, maybe you like mayo…

10 -18 Οκτωβρίου 2008

Ώρα 21:00
Θέατρο Θησείον

Τουρναβίτου 7
Αθήνα

Τηλ. 210 32 55 444

Terzopoulos or Soupopulos! / * (1 star)

I don’t know the original play and probably I wont read it after seeing what I saw, neither I have seen his previews works, I start saying this so my point of view is understand by the occasional reader. But truly the show I saw yesterday left me sad, sad because, it is the fault of shows like this that so many people consider theatre something boring and unreachable. I’m referring to Mademoiselle Julie, August Strindberg’s classic play at the Attis Theatre directed by famous Theodoros Terzopoulos.



The first impression I had when I sat down in my chair in the theatre is the sense that I had just enter a church and that I had to behave, this felling grew bigger and bigger during one of the longest hours in my life, 4 actors with not a trace of fun in their eyes come dragging their feet in a very heavily fashion until they position their self in the 4 corners of the theatre where they will stay for the rest of the duration of the show, as a sense in the space this position has no dramatic interest it has no conflict. They will talk and talk and not once they will look at each other, they will scream and they will hurt your ears with voices that don’t have an ounce of pleasure. The only good moment of the show is when the young actress hides her self and shows only her beautiful legs, this is what give this performance one star. I didn’t understand a thing about what was happening on the stage, later after the show while I was running away from the theatre I learned that there was something to do with vampires, something that made me hate more what I had just seen.



At the end when the actors where taking a bow you could see in their faces that they believe that they where doing something very important, I’m truly sorry if you believe that this is not your job! Theatre is a game! And acting is also called playing!



This is the type of show where you can hear all the time the sound of people reaccommodating in the chairs instead of being on the edge of your chair.



Don’t see it spare yourself. I bought a washing machine and I was very happy washing lots of things that where dirty for a long time. I went to the show and all I could think of while the performance was happening is how happy would I had been if I had stay home looking in to the glass of my new machine while it turns, imagine!

On The Blink / **** (4 star)

Yesterday night I saw a performance that inspired me to start hopefully a series of writings about theatre in Athens and Greece, the city and the country were I reside as non-Greek speaker yet. This position gives me the privilege to be a naïve witness of what happens on the stage beyond the meaning of the words that so often bores the audience to death. It is my objective here to give my opinion to non-Greek speakers and hopefully also Greek speakers living in Athens of what is on the menu that we can order and enjoy.

On the Blink a dance/theatre/poor circus is a performance in witch three actors/dancers/performers full of fun take you on a series of games and very well accomplished images. A mix of Artaud and Pina Bausch where young director Kalliroi Papadopoulou using all the elements that this awkward looking space and the performers themselves propose, finds a very simple, entertaining and captivating proposal. Of what? I really couldn’t say, there is the subject of Love for sure, but you couldn’t really point it out, that is probably what captivated me so much, you are not ask to decipher any idea imposed by a director, you are just ask to surf the wave and flow with it from the very beginning, where you stand in the stage along with all the other audience members, the actors are in the place where you thought you where to be seat it. The action moves from one place to another with easiness and weirdly enough in this type of experiment you don’t really feel a cut in the rhythm. Then it shifts to a conventional coding, audience seating and action on the stage, to a grand finale in the lobby of the “Theatre” where on top of everything you’re being offered a glass of wine by the three talented performers themselves, not like in other performances where they have to give you the drink before so your brain and body are prepared to suffer for an hour (sometimes more) of unimaginable bored ness almost to the state of medical coma where the only thing you are really asking is for some one to pull the plug. A live Dj/performer/singer with very accurate sounds accompanies the whole thing and he and the actors sometimes perform live music.

The whole thing sounds very promising but there is a catch to it. You wont be able to see it. Last night was their last of three shows and there are no plans to perform again as somebody told me. Why? The usual when we are talking about theatre whether you are in Athens, in London, in Bogota or Cafarnaun there is no money and the money came from the company itself as I was told by some one close to the company. What a shame that good things like this pass unnoticed and some others that will deserve a sudden death are supported and stay alive for longer that they were meant for.

To wrap it up, I would fully recommend this one! A very lively, honest and dynamic way of spending your time. To bad it’s a bit late!

Federico Nieto - El' Gazi

Sunday 12/10/08 But luckily they are back for a few days.

16,17,18,19 October 2008, Θέατρο Χοροροές, Ιάκχου 14, 11854, Γκάζι, μετρό Κεραμεικός, +302103479426