Open to Public / Antigone in Ferguson at St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church
Antigone in Ferguson at St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church
Translated and Directed by Bryan Doerries
Music Composed By Phil Woodmore
Free Event
This innovative project fuses dramatic readings by acclaimed actors of Sophocles’ Antigone with live choral musicperformed by a choir of activists, police officers, youth, and concerned citizens from Ferguson and New York City. Each performance culminates in a powerful, audience-driven discussion of race and gender-based violence and social justice.
Featuring a rotating cast of actors, including; Amy Ryan, Chris Noth, Paul Giamatti, Jumaane Williams, Kathryn Erbe, Obi Abili, Linda Powell, Josh Hamilton, and David Strathairn.
With the following guest choirs:
R.Evolucion Latina
Brooklyn Interdenominational Chorus
United Voices of Hope
The Guardians
Bethel Gospel Assembly
Abrons Arts
Songs of Solomon
“Gospel strains that make the rafters tremble….Viscerally lifts the play into timelessness.”
About the play
-
Antigone by Sophocles
Sophocles’ Antigone is an ancient play about a teenage girl who wishes to bury her brother, Polyneices, who recently died in a brutal civil war. Creon, the new, untested king, has ruled that Polyneices’ body must remain above the earth, and that anyone who breaks this law will be put to death. Antigone openly and intentionally defies his edict, covering her brother’s body with dirt and publicly declaring her allegiance to a higher law, one that transcends that of the state—the law of love. Creon is then forced, by his own political rhetoric, and the by fragile social order that he has barely begun to establish since the civil war, to make an example of his niece, by sentencing her to death. In the process of following through with his own decree, Creon loses everything. At its core, Antigone is a play about what happens when personal conviction and state law clash, raising the question: When everyone is right (or feels justified), how do we avert the violence that will inevitably take place?
Cast Members
-
Chris Noth
Creon
-
Diamond Jones
Antigone
-
Jumaane Williams
Haemon/Guard/Messenger
-
Marjolaine Goldsmith
Ismene/Eurydice
-
Willie Woodmore
Tiresias
Antigone in Ferguson at St. Ann's & The Holy Trinity Church Partners
Explore Projects
-
Pandemic & Climate CrisisAn Enemy of The PeopleAn Enemy of the People presents acclaimed actors, public health leaders, scientists, journalists, elected officials, and local community members performing dramatic readings of scenes from Henrik Ibsen’s 1882 play An Enemy of the People to help frame powerful, guided audience discussions aimed at generating connection, understanding, compassion, moral repair, and much-needed healing. The play tells the story of a doctor who discovers the water supply in his small, rural town has been poisoned by a tannery. Despite his efforts to convey the truth to the public, the doctor fails to save his community from environmental disaster and is ultimately scapegoated for his whistleblowing. An Enemy of the People was first performed in Norway in 1882, and yet it speaks to the present moment as if it were written for our times — to the corrosive influence of power and money in politics, the distortions of the media, and the many other challenges to public health in our culture today, especially during times of crisis.
-
Pandemic & Climate CrisisPoetry for the PandemicUsing poetry as a catalyst for an Intergenerational performance and discussion during the Covid-19 pandemic.
-
Natural DisasterBook of JobThe Book of Job Project presents dramatic readings by acclaimed actors of The Book of Job as a catalyst for powerful, guided conversations about the impact of natural and manmade disasters upon individuals, families, and communities.