Drama Theatre Skopje

“Iphigenia for Nothing” is a contemporary adaptation of Euripides’ ancient tragedy, which focuses on the personal and family conflicts that arise from sacrifice in the name of “higher goals”. Based on “Iphigenia at Aulis” and the myth of the killing of the sacred deer of the goddess Artemis, this production uses elements of physical and dance theater. While Euripides’ tragedy explores the powerlessness of man before the will of the gods, this adaptation emphasizes the symbolism of Iphigenia’s death as a consequence not only of her father’s military ambitions, but also of the broader mechanisms of political corruption and nationalist ideologies. This production uses fragmentation, dance, physical action and image-making. This is a theater performance free from narrative. A theater where language does not dominate. A theater that perhaps does not want to be “understood”, but to be witnessed, felt and experienced. Our Iphigenia lives in the zone of discomfort. She is a girl living out the last days of her life. A body that refuses to stop moving. Her death is neither noble nor heroic—it is the product of family manipulation and instrumentalized patriotic rhetoric. Killed without love or empathy, her suffering becomes a symbol of the ways in which systems of power use human lives for personal and collective gain. She dies not for something, but for nothing, and thus becomes part of a larger social mechanism that swallows up individual will and replaces it with ideological discipline.