Historia de un amor or The ants, 2011

1 male - 1 female

Thanasis Triaridis

A man, N, welcomes a woman, O, in a secluded country house built in the woods. The woman is a high-end prostitute specializing in sado-masochistic bondage, who N has booked and pre-paid online. The man, weirdly noble, asks her to address him with the marital salutation "darling", and handcuff herself to the old-fashioned, four-meter, cast-iron antique bed that dominates the stage... After explaining the rules to him, O initiates the sexual game of verbal challenge. In a seemingly inexplicable effort to put himself in her place, N is accidentally tied up facing her, on the opposite headboard of the huge bed.

Two people naked, tied opposite one another: this is the play’s dramatic condition. A fierce game of mental space-conquest spreads (: infects) onstage and in the protagonists’ minds. Is N really a perverted killer, as the woman suspects? Is he actually getting ready to ritually kill O, after extorting her confession that no one is going to search for her? Or is N simply a victim of his own carelessness, as he himself claims? What can these two be expecting now, trapped as they are? Why can’t they touch each other? What necessary or even fatal destiny are they fulfilling?

As speaking is the only option the tied-up couple has, questions multiply. A preposterous prospect surfaces: the ants of the forest are going to come out and ravage the two people. An old story of irrational love between a man and a horse bizarrely validates the terror the ants bring in the depths of consciousness. To what degree can this improbability be taken seriously, and dominate their evening? Who is lighting and blowing out the candles? Who is starting and stopping the music, constantly playing the same song – Historia de un amor? Why are they – in their alleged and imaginary marital life – talking about a sunset in a church in Venice? And what has happened to their alleged child? What are their true ages? Who are they in reality?

As time passes, N speaks of a perverse crime of the past – which brings that night to an end. The ants are coming to avenge. O collapses – she begs N to kill her; she just wants to make him stop talking. N speaks of God – or is it the devil? What are the glorious sunsets really about? And, finally, what do the ants signify? Fear and threat, end and praying, or death? Fulfillment?

And then it's time to blow out the candles one last time, and for that song to be heard again...

PLAYS

MENGELE, 2012

1 male - 1 female

Liberté, 2013

1 male - 1 female

Égalité, 2013

2 female

Humlet, 2013

2 male

Oedinous, 2013

1 male - 1 female

Zoot, 2013

2 female

Lebensraum, 2014

2 characters (2 male or 2 female)

Zyklon or destiny, 2014

1 male - 1 female

ESSAYS

THANASIS TRIARIDIS' THEATRE

                                                                                              [Translation: Elena Delliou]

There are ...