Final Bell

In a world where survival of the fittest reigns supreme with high achieving high school students killing to secure their class rank, no student is safe. Melody, the salutatorian of Johnson High School, is the only student who claims to have obtained her rank without any schemes or violent acts. Yet, the top five students of Johnson High have been placed in a pressure cooker in the days leading up to the final rank calculation before graduation. Melody is forced to answer the question she’s avoided her whole life: What are you willing to do to survive?

Cast & Crew

Adeline Ferolo - Lead Producer/Sound Operator

JoJo Knott - Producer/Lighting Operator

France Violet Jones - Playwright

Louise Colin - Director

Tilly Lung - Stage Manager

Skylar Causy - Assistant Stage Manager/Production Coordinator

Camiryn Dorlinn - Melody

Marisa Gonzales - Daisy

Jonny–James Kajoba - Kendrick

Jordan Reilly - Alexandra

Feonix Russell - Judah

Kathrina Davila - Composer/Sound Designer

After the great success of “The Cenci Family”, the performance that was praised by Broadwayworld.com last spring, the Tank NYC presents as part of this June’s program at The Tank’s Proscenium Theater (312 W 36th St, New York, NY, 10018) the new show by the groundbreaking Greek director Ioli Andreadi, Euripides’ «HELEN». In this show, which is the sixth direction that Ioli Andreadi brings to the Tank Theater in the last 6 years, the true story of Helen of Troy is presented through a precisely choreographed stage performance, subverting the clichés of how ancient tragedy is usually performed. Starring the famous Greek actress Vasiliki Troufakou, who performs all the roles in the play, moving impressively from one hero to another, utilizing her voice and body as the only means of transformation between characters, and joining her onstage is the leading Greek percussionist Nikos Touliatos, who creates a live ritualistic soundscape. The play was adapted by the two prolific Greek playwrights Ioli Andreadi and Aris Asproulis. The show, which has received excellent reviews and has been awarded the historic distinction of being the first theatre performance to ever take place at the historic archaeological site of the 4th century AD Bishop’s Basilica in Ancient Philippopolis (Plovdiv, Bulgaria), is presented in New York on Thursday June 19th at 7pm, Friday June 20th at 7pm and Saturday June 21st at 3pm, with English surtitles. With the kind sponsorship of THE GEORGE AND VICTORIA KARELIAS FOUNDATION, the support of CARNEGIE DINER & CAFE and the auspices of THE CONSULATE GENERAL OF GREECE IN NEW YORK

THE TANK THEATER

312 W 36th St, New York, NY, 10018

Euripides’

HELEN

Directed by Ioli Andreadi

JUNE 19 @ 7pm | JUNE 20 @ 7pm | JUNE 21 @ 3pm
with English surtitles

Video trailer
https://youtu.be/L8xgDmoicZg

Ioli Andreadi masterfully directs a ritualistic “Helen”, overthrowing the clichés of how tragedy is usually being played and leading Vasiliki Troufakou to her personal acting transcendence.

GEORGIA OIKONOMOU - NEWS247

The Plot
They say that an old bard, Stisihoros, six generations before Euripides, in one of his poems accused Helen of leaving her husband Menelaus for Paris and with her sin she destroyed both Greece and Troy. But Helen became a goddess after her death. That is why Stisichoros was punished with blindness the moment he wrote this unjust poem. And he regretted it. And he wrote a new poem, a new song. In it, he reconstructed his accusations, using the ancient myth, according to which Helen never set foot in Troy, only her shadow did, while she herself was banished by the gods to Egypt, where she waited for Menelaus to return from the war and for them to leave together for their homeland. And when Stisichoros wrote this new song, he immediately regained his sight. In this version of Euripides’ Helen for solo actress, Helen arrives on stage, alone and blind like an ancient performer of epic poetry, but with other, Eleusinian forces awakening within her, prompting her to tell her story, the story of a shadow.

Director’s note
“Euripides’ Helen is not a tragicomedy, as many believe. It is a frighteningly timely and heartbreaking piece of work. A tragic work that speaks of the ‘here and now’. A work for the woman. And a play about war. About the radical innocence of women and the way their fate is so often woven solely through the decisions and violence of men. A play about the futile madness of war and the empty shirts it gives away as trophies. A play about the absurdity of battle and the wounds of love. A play about beauty as a source of unhappiness. I choose this ‘woman’s play’ to be performed entirely by a female actress, Vasiliki Troufakou, facing multiple historical roles within an hour, male and female, younger and older, because I want us to explore, against the interpretive and directorial stereotypes, the female identity and the female body as a multiform scenic experience and as a source of connection to the root of the tragic. A companion on this scenic route as a valuable interlocutor is the rhythm through the ritualistic soundscape of the percussion of Nikos Touliatos”. | Ioli Andreadi

Cast
Vasiliki Troufakou performs all the roles
Live soundscape by Nikos Touliatos

Crew
Direction: Ioli Andreadi
Adaptation: Ioli Andreadi & Aris Asproulis
Translation: Yangos Andreadis
Translation in English: Ioli Andreadi
Costumes Design: Ioanna Kourbela‎
Cover final song: Danai Nielsen
Photos: Ilias Kotsireas & Kiki Papadopoulou
Video trailer: Michael Mavromoustakos

WITH THE KIND SPONSORSHIP OF

THE GEORGE & VICTORIA KARELIAS FOUNDATION

SUPPPORTER
CARNEGIE
DINER & CAFE

UNDER THE AUSPICES OF
THE CONSULATE GENERAL OF GREECE IN NEW YORK

WHO ARE IOLI ANDREADI AND ARIS ASRPOULIS?
Ioli Andreadi, theatre and performance director, playwright, researcher, Assistant Professor at the University of Western Macedonia specializing in Theater and Education, and Aris Asproulis, playwright, Dr. of Sociology, Panteion University, Director of Communication of the Municipal Theatre of Piraeus and the historic Art Theater Karolos Koun, have co-authored 16 theatrical plays (original and adaptations) from 2015 until today, which have been staged in New York, London, Sofia, Plovdiv, Athens and Thessaloniki, directed by Ioli Andreadi and having received excellent reviews. Ioli Andreadi and Aris Asproulis specialize in creating original theatrical works, based on the study of real events, through research of primary archival material; documents and publications; interviews; books; field work. They also share a deep interest in the Classics (literature, theatre, art), having adapted for the stage Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind, Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and Euripides’ Ion and Helen. Their work also includes three new plays on the life and work of Antonin Artaud: Artaud/Van Gogh, The Cenci Family and Bone. All their plays have been published by Kapa Publishing House.

Since 2003, Ioli has worked as a theatre director and playwright in Greece and abroad (UK, New York, Berlin, Rome, Bulgaria), having directed 40 theatre productions. She trained as an actress at the Art Theatre Karolos Koun and she studied Directing at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London (MA). Her PhD in Theatre and Performance at King’s College London was published in English by Kapa Publishing House under the title: Anastenaria: Ritual, Theatre, Performance; An Experiential Study (2020). She is a Fulbright Artist, having conducted her research on the dialogue between musical theatre and ancient tragedy in NY (NYMF, City Center Studios). She is a member of the Lincoln Center Theater Director’s Lab as an SNF grantee. Since 2015 she is teaching yoga for actors (Yoga Alliance certification). She is teaching Performance: Theory and Practice (her book Performance: Theory and Practice; Directing, Philosophy and Culture was published by KPH) as a Guest Lecturer at Universities in Greece and abroad (University of Athens, University of Cyprus, King’s College London, Aberystwyth University, Brooklyn College CUNY, University of Greenwich UK) and Theatre and Education, both theoretically and practically, as an Assistant Professor at the University of Western Macedonia (her book Theatre and Education:Theory and Practice was published by Kapa Publishing House in 2023).

Since 2006, Aris has worked as a publicist of both major and experimental theatre and cultural events, national and international, in Greece, including Epidaurus and Odeon of Herodes Atticus. The current academic year he is teaching Sociology of Work at the Department of Social Policy of Panteion University, Athens.

Original plays
• 2015 & 2022 & 2023 & 2024 – “Artaud / Van Gogh” (Semeio Theatre & Art Theatre Karolos Koun & The Tank Theater – New York & International Monodrama Festival, Sofia, Bougaria)

• 2015 & 2022 - “The Cenci Family” (Michael Cacoyiannis Foundation & Art Theatre Karolos Koun - Greece)

• 2016 - “Two hundred and ten thousand yarns of cotton – performing the archive” (Cultural Foundation of Piraeus Bank Group, PIOP - Greece)

• 2016 - “Young Lear” (Athens and Epidaurus Festival, Piraeus 260 – Greece)

• 2019 - “In memory of a young child” (Athens Asylon Aniaton/Hospice for Neuro-disability – Greece & Jubilee Theater – University of Roehampton – London UK)

• 2021 & 2022 - “FILIKI ETERIA: the Brotherhood behind the Revolution” (Museums of the Piraeus Group Cultural Foundation – Greece & The Tank Theater – New York)

• 2022 & 2023 & 2024 - “Βone” (Art Theatre Karolos Koun, Semeio Theatre – Greece & The Tank Theater - New York & International Monodrama Festival, Sofia, Boulgaria)

• 2024-2025 - “MANOLIS / heart in four strings” (National Theatre of Northern Greece)

Adaptations
• 2017 - “A man returns to his home believing he will get killed and gets killed” – new ritualistic version for two people of the play “Murder in the Cathedral” by T.S. Eliot on the translation by George Seferis (Art Theatre Karolos Koun - Greece)

• 2017-2019 - “Every Brilliant Thing” by Duncan McMillan and Jonny Donahoe (New World Theater - Greece & The Hellenic Center – London)

• 2017-2019 - “Ion” by Euripides (Philippi Festival, Acropolis, Delphi – Greece & The Tank Theater – New York)

• 2018 - “The Misanthrope” by Moliere (Contemporary Theater - Greece)

• 2019-2020 - “War and Peace” by Leo Tolstoy (Municipal Theatre of Piraeus - Greece)

• 2020 - “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen (Alkyonis Theatre - Greece)

• 2020 & 2022 & 2023 & 2025 - “Helen” by Euripides (Philippi Festival & Roes Theatre - Greece & Plovdiv Drama Theatre – Bulgaria & The Tank Theater – New York)

• 2025 - “Gone with the wind” by Margaret Mitchell (Municipal Theatre of Piraeus - Greece)