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Caution to the Resistance ...

 

A Note from the Director:

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Anouilh’s Antigone was first produced under the Nazi occupation of France in February, 1942. It passed the Nazi censors, and was approved for production by the Third Reich. Perhaps the classical title was a distraction.

 

In Anouilh’s adaptation we witness the cautionary tale of a party of survivors at war with itself, symbolizing a resistance to fascism and a mirror to our own fractured present. This is the tragedy of a "new order" fractured by a generational divide: between a veteran guard that "said yes" to the burden of leadership, and an iconoclastic generation that "says no" to the sacrifices that follow.

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Creon represents the architects of stability. To him, progress is incremental—it requires dirty hands and labeling a Good and an Evil. He views Antigone’s defiance not as heroism, but as a dangerous internal threat to the fragile peace he has built.

 

Antigone represents the radical conscience of the youth. To her, Creon’s peace is a spiritual death. She refuses to accept a world where happiness is a construct of stability that means asking no questions, where it is bought through bureaucratic silence, where we must blind ourselves to those left dying.

 

Underlying this clash is the fundamental tragedy of the human contradiction, where we recognize that true peace is only achievable by eliminating the desire for power, yet mankind remains perpetually driven to seek power absolutely. Creon seeks power to enforce order; Antigone seeks the absolute power of her own integrity. In the vacuum between his pragmatism and her purity, the dream of a better world collapses. We are left to wonder: Can a society ever find peace when its survival depends on the very power that corrupts it?

 

The ultimate tragedy is that the death of the idealist results in the apathy of the masses, and the wheel spins round and round. By choosing a convenient peace, we trade awareness for a false sense of security, accepting the promise of safety in exchange for silence, and thus elevate a society that is easiest to control. By silencing the radical voice, we leave ourselves vulnerable to the very authoritarians who seek to enslave us. Enter Fascism 2025.

 

SoHo Shakespeare Company's Antigone

 

Into the not-so-distant future: The time is 2030, and the neo-fascist Regime 47 has entered its Third Term in The United States. Creon is a King who rules over the North East Quarter of the country, while the 47th President continues to rule over all, now hailed as Supreme Leader. What will Creon do to maintain a fragile peace? What will Antigone do to break the illusion?