Dramaturgical intro 30 minutes before the evening performance (Foyer of the Drama Theatre, free entrance)

Hecuba by Tiago Rodrigues is a thrilling production that entwines the ancient tragedy by Euripides with a story of personal and institutional betrayal from the present day. The director and principal of one of the world's most prestigious theatre festivals, together with the first stage in France, presents a production that seamlessly combines the timeless issues of the ancient Trojan woman with the challenges of today's woman, actress and mother, who finds herself in a similar predicament as the often overlooked widow of the Trojan hero Priam. Tiago Rodrigues has built an ingenious "theatre within a theatre". The story revolves around Nádia, the actress who portrays Hekuba. In her personal life, she is dealing with the discovery that her son was abused in a state facility where she was forced to place him because he needed constant care due to his autism. Her difficult life decision, which was supposed to bring them both redemption from the deadlock, thus turns into an internalised horror. The story takes place over the course of one day, the day of the dress rehearsal and Nadia's court testimony, and we witness the intersection of the past and the present. The most responsible political representatives are trying to sweep the public scandal and the legal battle under the carpet. Thus, Nádia not only experiences tragedy but also survives it. On the one hand, she is a mother fighting for justice for her own child; on the other, she portrays a mother who wants revenge for the death of her son. It is thus a metatheatrical experience in which life and art mirror each other and blur the boundaries between the courtroom and the stage; The actors and actresses precisely balance on the edge between the ancient tragedy and the legal drama of today, thus emphasising this duality. The production is inspired by real events, in particular the scandal at the Mancy facility in Switzerland. Yet it avoids documentary realism. It draws authenticity from the experience of the co-author of the text, Natache Kotuchomov, an actress and former director of the Swiss Comédie de Genève, who survived a similar tragedy. Hecuba is a reminder of the role of Athenian theatre in public discourse. It aims to provoke thought and empathy by offering a poetic justice that transcends the horizon of fiction. It is a meditation on the transformative power of theatre, through which the ancient pursuit of vengeance becomes a contemporary call for justice. Nádia, unlike Hecuba, strives for justice tempered by humanity and warns against allowing ourselves to get swallowed up in consuming pain. Hecuba is a production that gives a voice to those who don't have one themselves.