Antigone – on strike by Alexander Raptotasios. Park 90, 13 Clifton Terrace, Finsbury Park, London N4 to 23 February 2025,

3☆☆☆. Review: William Russell.

“Powerful by flawed play.”

Interesting, well performed, and challenging this piece of immersive theatre based loosely on Sophocles play about Antigone deals with how we react to the plight of the Isis wives. It is also inspired by the life of Shamima Begum, the 15 year old British girl who went to Syria in 2015, married a Dutch convert to Islam, had three children and eventually lost her British citizenship and all appeals for it to be restored have been rejected by the courts. The audience to respond to the plight of a girl called Esmeh. We only see her as an image on a television screen and instead we meet her sister Antiya, played by Hiba Medina, who has gone on hunger strike in a bid to raise support for her return. The immersive element is that the audience get tablets on which they can press a number responding to a question posed by Ty, played by Sorcha Brooks, who acts as a kind of inquisitor and the results get screen on one wall of the auditorium. The suggestion is that what we have said is being recorded and obviously the answers could be different every time the play is performed. That may be so but one does feel given the nature of the Park audiences the chances are they will be much the same every night of the run. The Home Secretary Creighton (Phil Cheadle) has decreed Esmeh is a danger to society and she has lost her citizenship while – believe it if you like - his son Eammon (Ali Hadji-Heshmati) backs Antiya. She is his girlfriend. Individually the performances are effective and Raptotasios has directed his play with considerable power but as political theatre Crichton's behaviour is hard to believe – no politician would rant like that at the dispatch box for a start – and Hadji-Heshmati has some problems convincing us that any politician's son would behave like he does.The mix of projected data and the presence of the exiled sister as a video are certainly skillfully used but somehow one feels manipulated by it all in favour of Esmeh being allowed to come back. Would she really be still a danger to society? Was she groomed? In real life Begum was certainly helped by some highly dubious people to join ISIS.I did not much enjoy it but flawed as it certainly is there is no denying that it is an interesting, problem posing evening.

Cast

Phil Cheadle – Creighton

Sorcha Brooks – Ty

Ali Hadji-Heshmati – Eammon

Hiba Medina – Antiya

Hanna Khogali – Esmeh

Creatives

Director – Alexander Raptotasios

Set Designer – Marco Tureich

Lighting Designer - Ariane Nixon

Video Content Creator – Victoria Belli

Dramaturg – Or Benezra Segal