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Press Releases

The NTNG in collaboration with the Municipal and Regional Theatre of Kavala (05/09/2014)

 
The National Theatre of Northern Greece, in collaboration with the Municipal and Regional Theatre of Kavala presents the production “The Grief of the Unemployed and the Right to be Lazy,” a performance–discussion, based on the work by Paul Lafargue and Nikos Panayotopoulos, directed by Thodoris Gonis.
 
The production, which was presented with great success at the Athens & Epidaurus Festival last June, will be presented at the Theatre of the Society for Macedonian Studies, from September the 19th to September the 27th, 2014.
 
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A few words on the play
The ruthless financial crisis aborts everyday lives and disassembles the social state. The dark Greek reality in the beginnings of the 21st century converses on stage with a heretic text, written in 1880 by Karl Marx’s brother-in-law. Lafargue’s declaration of the right for leisure time, as an antidote to the underpaid exhausting labour that leads to misfortune is juxtaposed with monologues of people who experience the anguish of unemployment nowadays, as they were written down by Nikos Panayotopoulos. Thodoris Gonis reveals, through the genre of documentary theatre, the real picture of the misery which we are experiencing, and he proposes a peculiar resolution.
 
...However...
 
A couple of years ago, while I was observing that the unemployment deprives the unemployed, not only of their survival means, but also of their reason of existence, that it degrades its relation to the world, yet to time and space, that its continuously escalating presence –that establishes work as something in great demand and greatly prized– tends to haunt everyone’s conscience and subconscious, it tends to place the employees at the mercy of the employers who can abuse their power, and, finally it will lead to the formation of a ruthless competition, even within the working environment, destroying all values of solidarity and humanism, people used to say that I was exaggerating.
However, that’s what we experience nowadays... Only a few years later!
As I pinpoint that the massive presence of the unemployed today can remind all employees that they have common interests with them (as their existence burdens the employees themselves, and their working conditions), and that they are the outcome of a policy that can be confounded through an effective action plan, that would unite the working people and the unemployed, not only within the borders of the country, but also among other countries, people might say that I am a desperate optimist.
However, we can still experience it!  
 
Nikos Panayotopoulos
 
 
Since the quantity of work required by society is necessarily limited by consumption and by the supply of raw materials, why devour in six months the work of a whole year?
Why not distribute it levelly over the twelve months period and force every labourer to content himself with six or five hours a day throughout the year, instead of getting indigestion from twelve hours during six months?
Once assured of their daily portion of work, the labourers will no longer be jealous of each other, no longer fight to snatch away work from each other's hands and bread from each other’s mouths; and then, not exhausted in body and mind, they will begin to practice the virtues of laziness.
Brutalized by their nutrition, the labourers have been unable to conceive of this certain fact, that to have work for all, they ought to apportion it like water on a ship in a danger situation.
 
The eccentric viewpoint of Paul Lafargue, who was Marx’s secretary and brother-in-law, is about to meet the desperate cry of today’s unemployed, as it reaches our ears through the interviews gathered by Nikos Panayotopoulos.
 
People crushed, under the burden of poverty, and of the anxiety about their future, like contemporary miserables, identical to their ancestors.
                                          
In this unpredictable meeting, the query of the unjustified doesn’t remain suspended, but –in one of these rare moments– it finds its answer. A specific resolution that might not be directly and practically applicable, but lead us far beyond the usual political rhetoric and reveals a well-rounded and definitely real picture before our very eyes.
 
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CONTRIBUTORS
Director: Thodoris Gonis
Set Design: Eleni Stroulia
Lighting: Tassos Palaioroutas
Assistant Director: Κaterina Simeonidou
 
Editing of the Theatrical Text: Thodoris Gonis, Eleni Stroulia
Performers: Iris Nikolaou, Klea Samanta, Pavlos Stavropoulos, Petros Papazissis
 
FOR ONLY 7 PERFORMANCES: From the 19th to 27th of September, 2014.
 
PERFORMANCE DATES:
Friday 19/9, Saturday 20/9, Sunday 21/9
Wednesday 24/9, Thursday 25/9, Friday 26/9, Saturday 27/9
Starting time: 21.00

 
Ticket Prices:
Normal: 15€
Discount (students, 65 plus, multi-child families):€ 12
Students that apply to the framework of the Collaboration Agreement signed by the NTNG and the Ministry of Education €8
Ticket for the unemployed: €5
 
Tickets Presale:
  • NTNG Box Offices
  • VIVA Τel: 11876
  • Public” Department Stores in Thessaloniki (24, Tsimiski St. – 33, Mitropoleos St. & Mediterranean Cosmos Shopping Centre, Seven Spots video stores)
  • Seven Spots Video Stores
  • Ianos Bookstores 
Box Office Opening Hours:
Royal (Vassiliko) Theatro (White Tower Square)
: Tuesday–Sunday 09:30–21:30
 
Contact information: +30 2315 200200
 
Media Sponsors
NERIT COMPANY, FIRST PROGRAMME (PROTO), THIRD PROGRAMME (TRITO),KOSMOS ΝΕRΙΤ, TV100, FM100, MEDIASOUP.GR, ONLYTHEATER.GR, iN2LIFE.GR, CULTURENOW.GR, MONOPOLI.GR, THESTIVAL.GR, PAROYSIAZW.GR, EGNATIAPOST.GR, UNITEDREPORTERS, GLOW, EXOSTIS MAGAZINE, BISCOTTO MAGAZINE, BISCOTTO.GR, IQ MAGAZINE, MYCAMPUS.GR, FILM NOIR MAGAZINE, AVLEA MAGAZINE, OSTRIA (Ως3).GR, TΗΕSSALONIKICITYGUIDE.GR
 
With the support of the restaurant ΖYΘΟΣ

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