Medea

Satoshi Miyagi, celebrated Artistic Director of Japan’s SPAC (Shizuoka Performing Arts Center), confronts the haunting legacy of empire with a spectacular contemporary reinterpretation of Euripides’ Medea, set in Japan’s late 19th-century Meiji era.

Through breath-taking visual symbolism, traditional music, and a form-defying performance, tradition and experimentation are fused in a bold postcolonial feminist retelling of Euripides’ classic. In Miyagi’s signature style, each character is played by two performers: a “speaker,” here played by men, and a “mover,” played by women, using movement rooted in kabuki technique.

Medea is the shocking story of a woman who, betrayed and cast aside by her treacherous lover, takes hideous revenge by murdering the children they both love.

During the male-dominated Meiji era imperial ambition masked itself as modernisation. Male diners at a traditional restaurant summon female waitresses for entertainment, and the tragic tale of Medea unfolds as a play-within-a-play. Miyagi uses Euripides’ tragedy to create a searing critique of nationalism, gendered oppression, and colonial violence.

This stunning and internationally acclaimed production, which has travelled to 20 cities and 11 countries, provides a fresh, dynamic take on this timeless story of grief, betrayal, and vengeance.

In Japanese with English surtitles

Directed by Satoshi Miyagi

Original Text by Euripides

Music by Hiroko Tanakawa

Book tickets at The Coronet Theatre