Beyond Zorba – the prolific and turbulent life of Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis
Mikis Theodorakis remembered
Zorba’s theme from the 1964 film is what the composer Mikis Theodorakis will always be known for outside his native Greece, but in his time he was a figure on the world stage, rubbing shoulders with poets, politicians and artists like Pablo Neruda, Olof Palme and Salvador Dali. His most powerful music evokes a spirit of heroic rebellion that resonated with liberation movements from Greece to Latin America. And, far beyond Zorba, he wrote classical symphonies, ballets, operas, and popular songs as light as a sea breeze.
Maria Margaronis recalls this most prolific and energetic composer and political activist, who was arrested, exiled, imprisoned and tortured many times during the most turbulent years of Greece’s 20th Century, but who clung to his belief that art is not a decoration but a necessity.
Maria’s guests include Gail Holst-Warhaft, poet, musician and biographer; film-maker and festival-promoter Asteris Kutulas, actor and politician Lydia Koniordou; and the legendary interpreter of Theodorakis’ work, Maria Farantouri.
EPIDAURUS, Greece — As dusk fell here on Saturday, a white-robed chorus filed onto the sparse stage of a limestone amphitheater for the National Theater of Greece’s production of “The Persians,” the world’s oldest surviving dramatic work.
It was on this stage in 472 B.C. that Aeschylus’s play was reputedly first performed — but this time, it was the audience, not the cast, that was wearing masks.
The show, which was taking place as part of the Athens and Epidaurus Festival, was livestreamed to an audience around the world and was hailed as theater’s return to the place where it all began after the coronavirus lockdown darkened stages across Greece. To abide by restrictions set by the health authorities, visitors wore masks to enter and leave the amphitheater, and ushers in plastic visors and surgical gloves enforced social distancing. The theater’s usual 10,000-seat capacity was capped at 4,500.
ImageAn usher at the performance of “The Persians” on July 24.
An usher at the performance of “The Persians” on July 24.Credit…Costas Baltas/Reuters
Even before the pandemic, Greece’s theaters were in trouble. Years of austerity saw government spending on the arts slashed, with subsidies for the largest theaters cut in half, or withdrawn altogether for some smaller venues. As a deep recession hammered the economy, tens of thousands of businesses closed down, leaving little prospect of support from the private sector. Dozens of theaters closed; others survived only by cast members covering the costs of performances themselves.
As Greece started to emerge from its financial crisis, in 2018, state funding started trickling back; the major state-funded theaters edged up to three-quarters of their pre-crisis budgets, and the smaller theaters that survived recouped some of their losses.
Then the pandemic came and threatens to wash all those gains away.
On March 12, the government closed all theaters in the first wave of its response to the coronavirus. Since July 1, open-air venues have been allowed to resume, but only at half capacity. The conditions under which indoor venues would be allowed to reopen have yet to be decided by the health authorities, according to Nicholas Yatromanolakis, the general secretary of the Greek Culture Ministry.
“No one knows what will happen yet,” he said. “We have to roll with the punches.”
Even if closed theaters reopen in the fall, the social-distancing rules that they will most likely have to introduce will mean greatly reduced ticket sales — and state subsidies on their own are not enough to keep most organizations going.
Culture Minister Lydia Koniordou has sent a letter to British authorities asking for an intensification of talks for the return to Greece of the Parthenon Marbles, which are housed at the British Museum.
In a statement, the Culture Ministry said the move came on the heels of Koniordou’s visit to London in July.
In her letter, Koniordou emphasized the cultural and moral dimensions of the issue and cited the recent call for dialogue by UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Committee for Promoting the Return of Cultural Property to its Countries of Origin or its Restitution in case of Illicit Appropriation (ICPRCP).
Greek Culture Minister Lydia Koniordou brought up the issue of the return of the Parthenon Marbles to Greece during a visit to London this week, the ministry said in a press release on Friday.
The minister was in the British capital to participate in an event celebrating 100 years from the founding of the Koraes Chair of Modern Greek and Byzantine History at King's College London.
In a meeting with the UK’s Culture Secretary Matt Hancock and the Under Secretary of State for Culture Michael Ellis, Koniordou said the two sides should intensify dialog on a political level, citing the cultural and ethical dimensions of the issue.
Koniordou also mentioned the positive view of British public opinion on the reunification of the Parthenon Marbles.
