AntigoneNOW
Directing/Multi Performer Performance Research
Adapted for digital performance
Co-directed by Margaret Laurena Kemp and Sinéad Rushe
2020
A dead body in quarantine, unburied and left to rot. A world in strife, a nation in fear, a woman bereft: Antigone is forbidden to touch and lay to rest the body of her deceased brother. The ancient Greek tragedy "Antigone" gets a radical and reimagined filmed version with "Antigone: NOW!"
Margaret Laurena Kemp, associate professor of theatre and dance, and Sinead Rushe co-direct this contemporary response. This work confronts the isolation of our moment. Written around 440 B.C. by Sophocles, the play is the final of the Oedipus Trilogy and centers on Antigone’s attempts to bury the body of her brother.
Due to COVID-19, the production was created collaboratively by artists in the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, and Singapore through mobile phones, videos and iPads, and it was presented online rather than in live performances as originally planned. As a result of the online presentation, AntigoneNow was able to increase its outreach, being viewed by an audience of international viewers from 32 countries.
This production is part of Kemp and Rushe’s ongoing creative exploration of character through polyphonic vocalization and collective composition. They posit that character, like place or country or nation state, is not a point of departure but a construct or result, the assumption of an ever-contested role.
This project is now available for touring/screening. Contact MLK to see and learn more.