ANTIGONE IN MOLENBEEK

based on the drama by Stefan Hertmans, translated by Jerzy Koch.

Molenbeek is the name of a district in the capital of Belgium, Brussels. This underfunded, overcrowded space, located almost in the center of the European capital, is sometimes referred to as “little Morocco”. The world of glamorous media labels has also dubbed it the “base of jihad”. And it is here that the action of Stefan Hertmans (author of the famous “Wars and Turpentines” or “Louder than Snow”) puts the action of the drama inspired by the tragedy of Sophocles.

The poetic text, full of surprising images, tells the story of Nouria, a Belgian woman of Arab descent, a gifted law student who tries to collect her brother's body from a local morgue. For her, this is a family member, a beloved brother, a person with whom she spent all her childhood - for the local authorities, this is the perpetrator of the bombing. As in Sophocles, the heroine fights for the right to be buried and to her own mourning - the authorities, in the name of democratic procedures and security, take away this opportunity from her. The conflict gradually intensifies, and the heroine's efforts to extract the body become more and more obsessive and radical, exposing the abyss of emotions and affairs that the legal code cannot regulate.

Creating the character of modern Antigone, a woman burdened by the monstrous deed of her own brother, Hertmans tells us to look where no one wants to look - to face the difficult questions that this tale triggers and try to look through the eyes of the heroine. In the interpretation of Anna Smolar - winner of the Polityka Passport, a director eager to reach for marginalized topics - the text of the drama is treated like a score, and the music builds a bridge between the ancient dimension and the complex and tense contemporary.

Note: loud sounds and music can make some viewers feel uncomfortable