By
James Karas
What was the first modern Greek
play to be produced in the United States?
Your chance of getting that right
is less likely than winning the next $50 million lottery. There are some exceptions
of, course, especially if you are the son of the man who produced the play.
The play is called He
Who Must Die and it is an adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis’s great novel
Christ
Re-Crucified. It was staged at the Yale School of Drama in 1960. The
adapter of the play was Michael Antonakes. The play was produced again in 1972
at Salem State University, in Salem, Massachusetts
and Eleni Kazantzakis, Nikos’s widow was in attendance.
Skip forty years and land in Toronto (well, OK, Richmond Hill!)
where you will find He Who Must Die
being produced by an ambitious and talented young man named Dean Antonakes, the
son of Michael.
The production of a play, any
play, may not seem like a momentous event. But consider the following: Modern
Greek drama in Toronto, where the largest number of Greek-Canadians reside, is
almost non-existent. Nancy Athan-Mylonas keeps the theatrical flame flickering as
the Artistic Director of the Greek Community of Toronto’s Nefeli group. She has
produced a version of Kazantzakis’s Zorba the Greek but her focus is on
light comedy done mostly by young people for an audience that prefers song and
dance to serious theatre.
After Nancy, the desert.
Dean, who in real life runs a
software company, is producing He Who Must Die in order to
introduce Canadians to a play by Kazantzakis and to pay homage to his father on
the 40th anniversary of the last production of the work.
No production of a play can ever
be classified as a one-person operation but this venture comes awfully close.
Dean has spearheaded just about everything about the production from the idea,
to contacting Greek organizations, to finding a theatre, to raising funds and
to keeping everything flowing,. His official title is Artistic and Music
Director of the company.
The play is directed by Andrea
Emmerton who has more than 25 years of experience in directing plays.
Christ Re-Crucified (sometimes translated as The Greek Passion) is set
in a Greek village under Ottoman rule in 1922. The villagers are putting on a
play that will re-enact about Christ’s crucifixion. At the same time, a group
of refugees arrives at the outskirts of the village seeking help. As the title
suggests, the result is an enthralling story.
“The play forces people to face
their own Christian values” said Dean in a recent interview. It is done
entirely in English and he hopes that young people, including children, will be exposed to the play and to Kazantzakis in general.
The play has a Narrator and
mezzo-soprano Ariana Chris has accepted the role. Dean considers this a happy
coup. Chris is well-known in the operatic and Greek community and is “a major
plus” to the production.
“All of the speaking roles have been cast to experienced
stage actors, eleven of whom are Greek-Canadians. We are still looking for ten
adult male extras,” according to Dean.
The production will feature music
composed by Paul Demakis and played by famed instrumentalist Pavlo on guitar
and George Vasilakos on bouzouki and baglama. Samples of the music are
available on the production company’s website (see below).
The Antonakes family has deep
roots …in the United States. Dean’s grandfather served in the U.S. Army in
World War I and his father served in World War II. Any ideas of assimilation or
disappearance of Greek roots is dispelled quickly by Dean.
His father Michael taught in the
English Department of Salem State University from 1965 until his retirement in
1992. His specialty: Greek literature, especially Kazantzakis. In fact, Michael’s
doctoral thesis and much of his writing are centered on Kazantzakis. He also
translated Kazantzakis’s Russia: A Chronicle of Three Journeys in the Aftermath
of the Revolution with Thanasis
Maskaleris.
He studied for one year in Athens
and has written, directed and acted in over 40 productions, according to his
son. In fact, he is a member of Actors Equity, the union of professional
actors.
When son Dean was getting ready
to join the matrimonial sweepstakes, the Antonakeses took no chances: they
shipped him off to an AHEPA convention where he found, Nina, a nice Canadian
girl of Greek origin. She took no chances with him being swallowed by Americana
and brought him to the safe haven of Pickering, Ontario. Now she gets to do the
marketing for the play.
Professor Antonakes will give a
lecture entitled "A Tribute to the Life of Nikos Kazantzakis" on
Saturday October 13, 2012, 1:00 pm at the Gold Room of the North York Memorial
Community Hall, North York City Centre, 5100 Yonge Street, Toronto.
Dean makes no secret of his
enthusiasm for the play and the production. He does not hesitate to classify
the staging as the Greek cultural event of the decade, exclamation mark
included.
That truthfulness of that
assessment will depend on higher judgment, more theatrical experience and unambiguous
objectivity. No, I do not mean the audience. I mean his father.
__
He Who Must Die by Michael
Antonakes based on
Christ Re-Crucified by Nikos Kazantzakis will be performed six
times between January 4 and 6, 2013 at the Richmond Hill Centre for the
Preforming Arts, 10268 Yonge St. Richmond Hill, Ont. For more information go to
http://www.dmajorproductions.com/
or 905-787-8811
