Review: Antigone (Tron Theatre)
Sisterly love is put to the test in this two-hander adaptation
Sophocles was not concerned with characters being relatable. Not that he didn’t want audiences to empathise with his characters, but rather that making them everyday people wasn't as important in ancient Greek plays. Warlords, nobility, seers, and gods are the focus, with a line or two for a common soldier or messenger. Modern storytelling tends to speak to audiences where they are, making characters people can see themselves in. Both are trying to speak to human nature, just with different tactics. Lulu Raczka’s Antigone, directed by Finn Den Hertog, is trying to do both. This take is focusing solely on Antigone (Eilidh Loan) and Ismene (Holly Howden Gilchrist). They are still the daughters of kings and sisters of warring brothers, but also they are Scottish teenage girls, drinking in their rooms and talking about how to sneak into bars.
Raczka does a fantastic job weaving these worlds together without translating the story into some naff high school drama. It retains the drama of Sophocles’ classic but gives us a truly unique lens with a modern-ish setting and limited cast. Do not be mistaken into thinking this is a dumbed-down entry-point for Antigone; some familiarity with the story is necessary to appreciate this version. Between the two of them, Ismene and Antigone act out the scenes outside their fluffy white and yellow living room. Some of them are play pretend, some are real; all of them enrich the characters.
The titular sister is rebellious, guarded, proud, and a bit of a control freak. Loan exhibits unabashed star power in the role. Her moods swing wildly as she comes to terms with what she has done and the fate that likely awaits her, but she never loses sight of her moral core. She and Ismene flip between hope, despair, anger, even contempt as they reckon with their position and what they owe to their loved ones. To my shame, I thought Ismene seemed like a bit of a drip when I studied this play at school. Gilchrist’s Ismene is anything but a drip. She lives under the wing of her more outgoing sister, but she isn’t scared to tell her what she thinks of her act of heroism. And when Antigone defends her absent brothers in a bar, she goes to the other extreme. Antigone insists that because they are good men, then whatever they do must be “for good” – Ismene declares that she hopes both brothers are dead, to appease the oppressive crowd. Between them, they represent a very modern polarisation – one side blindly defends someone out of honour, the other conforming at all costs.
The only flaw in this modern adaptation, sadly, is also the crux of the whole story – the burial. Antigone’s argument for going against the rule of law and essentially sacrificing herself is that “all people deserve to be buried”. This is a line from the original play, but it misses a crucial point. Burial, according to the play and ancient Greek beliefs, wasn’t just a gesture. It ensured the passage of a person to the afterlife, to live among the dead. It wasn’t just honour that was at stake, but Polynices’ soul. This modern adaptation makes no mention of gods or afterlife, which lowers the stakes and makes Antigone’s actions more symbolic and prideful.
Even so, the moral issue at the centre of the story is never “solved”; no one side is favoured over the other. At the end, Ismene monologues about her life, her partner, her children, her family falling away one by one. It’s a rich life, but one lived under the shadow of her sister’s avoidable death. Still, she reflects that she would do the same for her children. I left feeling the weight of their relationship and their predicament heavily in my chest. Focusing on these two characters was intended to focus the story on the female experience, and it does so without narrowing the perspective. Instead, Raczka uses it to tease out every single theme. It is worth reading Sophocles’ play just to watch this adaptation. Four stars.
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