An interview with Konstantina Rodi for Greek News and Radio FL
The conversation with Takis Chrysikakos took place a few days before Christmas with the weather changing from summer to winter at a rapid pace. A Doric-style discussion, around the words of great Greeks whom he has embodied on stage, emphasizing a type of Theater that is both difficult and suddenly very alive.
What is it like to live by the sea, in a continuous summer?
Gorgeous. At some point in my life I decided that. I have been coming to Porto Rafti since the 80s, renting houses then. In the last 18-20 years or so I got this apartment here, renovated it from the ground up, in a very nice spot. It is in an apartment building, I have the sea in front of me, so it is very beautiful. Everyday I walk by the sea, I live in a really lonely but very full way. It expresses me one hundred percent.
I visualized what you said and stopped at the word "lonely". I directly felt that loneliness by the sea is very different from loneliness on a mountain or in a village. I think that by the sea you are never really alone.
It is certain. At one point when we were doing the Papadiamantis Short Stories, the musical choices were made by Lambros Liavas, the professor of ethnomusicology at the University of Athens, and I saw exactly the difference between mountain obituaries and island obituaries. The island songs are very sweet, very lyrical, with a nostalgia they leave there. They don't have that heaviness that continental or manic ones have, which are heartbreaking. Yes, the sea softens everything. Whatever problem I'm carrying, walking by the sea, it's like he takes it. He takes it away from me. Of course I swim 8-9 months a year, it's liberating.
The selection of works you have uploaded in recent years is like a canvas of Greece, with different pieces. What makes you decide to upload a project?
What I try to do, is to listen to the need of the world, of the time. I started with "The Sin of My Mother", by Vizyenos - when I considered it impossible that such a thing could happen. I had told the director "no, that's not possible" and others had told him the same, many years back. Anyway we made it, it was a great job. Then I just felt that now we have to show the world, to remind them, the great values of our country. I felt the need to talk about the greatest, as they call him, "the saint of letters", Papadiamantis. We are living in a decadent time worldwide, at this moment nothing important is happening spiritually on a global level. There is no corresponding Beckett, Pinter, Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller and other great writers, who when they wrote their works something happened. I remember e.g. that "The Bus of Desire" was staged one year in New York and the following year it was performed in Athens by Koun. Immediately the new one was coming. Now, there isn't. Many new directors take old texts and bring them up in their own way, just to talk about today, whether successful or not (you've heard what the conversation is about this). Finding the resonance of what I call 'theatrical narrative', I began to follow it. Because in the second staging of Papadiamantis, the importance of this theatrical genre became conscious. When a lady stopped me outside the foyer at a repeat of the show in a central theater in Athens, full of wonder she said to me "Mr. Chrysikakos, how come you are on the Stage and playing, while I am sitting in the Square, and I smell the sea" ; What's going on? When I analyzed this and understood - because this often happens, I now do it consciously - in this kind of theatrics of the narrative the actor on the Stage pulsates. It is not an allegory, the actor pulsates, represents, like the messenger in the ancient tragedy. It pulsates interpretatively. Like a book or a song, it immediately begins to create images and faces for us, depending on the education, the origins of each person, so here too, since the faces and the theater spaces do not exist on the Stage, the viewer begins to become a co-creator.
To fill in the blanks, the invisible.
Yes, he makes them up in his head. He creates them. While I'm telling them, I see them, and that's exactly what the viewer does too, seeing them with his own eyes, not mine. When I talk about something I have my own origins. I also do not oblige the viewer, taking the faces and places on the Stage as given, whether they like it or not. In this way, the viewer creates intimate spaces that can seduce and move him. Of course, many things followed after that: Manos Eleftheri's "Time of Chrysanthemums", a short story by Haritopoulos, "A reference to Greco" which has defined me not only as an actor, but also as a person – this for me is what defined me. Also the "According to Markon", last year and the year before, for the rebetiko a very serious study of Liavas, and now I repeat again the "Reference to Greco" because I felt it as a great need of myself.
"Reference to Greco" is the last work of Nikos Kazantzakis. What makes this work relevant?
The "Reference to Greco" is the last work, where he dies. He writes it in France where he lives in self-exile, after all the chasing he experienced in Greece. Apart from the great tenderness he has for Greece, he says, for example, "I hold in my fist the soil of Crete with sparkling sweetness, tenderness and gratitude", he says this in the military sense of the word 'report', that is, I go out to speak and refer to myself, as in a speech. And he does it to Theotokopoulos, because as he says "of all the fighters who live or have lived, only he can feel me", because Theotokopoulos was persecuted in Spain more than Kazantzakis. His works were burned in the squares, he was sentenced to death twice and his father-in-law spared him – that is, he spent all his life as a heretic so that now the churches and museums are full of the works of Theotokopoulos. He talks about his life, he even calls him 'grandpa'. "This is," he says, "my life, and if I did it right" all he asks is "give me your wish." And ending, after making his apology, from his childhood to the end, he says "that was it, now you judge", "I kiss your right shoulder, I kiss your gerbil shoulder, grandpa, I found you well" . And she goes to meet him. Because, really, when Kazantzakis writes the "Reference to Greco" for the third time, he dies. It is as if he knows this thing, and ends the book with this sentence: "grandfather, I have found you well" and goes to find him. All of Kazantzakis's so important works are a fiction, except for Zorba - which is also a fiction, despite the fact that he and Zorba lived together for six months. Taking this personality as the exact opposite of him - since Kazantzakis was a studious, caring, etc. man, and the other the exact opposite - this shocks him (because a large chapter in the "Report" has to do with Zorba ). He explains his relationship with Zorba, he says "in the middle of the night he would shout and cry and tell me to shake off the parental shell of prudence and habit and leave for the long and endless journeys with him, and I remained unsullied, sulking. I've been embarrassed many times in my life, but I've never been as embarrassed as in front of Zorba." In other words, what was revolutionary about him, the fact that he did not calculate anything, which Kazantzakis did not have, this shocked Zorba, so much so that when the news of his death comes with a letter from Skopje, which was the mine he had gone to , in an outburst of Kazantzakis he says "because he knows that I loved him more in my life". Great conversation, because while he has his mother who adores her, he says that he loved him more. This conversation is very long. Terrible the size of friendship. This is in "Report", not "Zorba". He is struck "what can I do to be able to keep him alive", and the next day he says "I woke up and I already knew what I had to do to keep him alive". And without him saying it, we learn what he means: he writes the book. So that throughout the ages Zorbas will be alive. So here the viewer sees, as if through a keyhole, the life of a huge man, such as Kazantzakis, because he is not only a writer. He is a thinker, a researcher, a man who innovated in everything. You don't take Kazantzakis to read a book, or two, and then close it – you take pieces that are now a way of your life, they help you in everything. It says e.g. in the "Go Where You Can't" Report. What a great phrase! We learn that we don't use even 10% of our potential, and he tells you to 'go beyond the limits', what great people do and have made important things, at all levels. For me, my references are in art, but I lived it, I know it: Koon like this, for example. grow up He crossed the line. They lived in possession with a handful of raisins and at the same time created. And not only Kuhn, but so many others - I mention him because I lived him. So big. Through deprivation, from nothing, Theophilos, Van Gogh... This is Kazantzakis. First of all, it unlocked me because studying ten years ago to do the show and the theatrical adaptation, when I went on stage with the rehearsals, these words started to come out as if they were hidden inside me. When I'm on stage, I'm not acting. I speak as if these were my own words, I am not interpreting anyone, I am speaking. It's as if he planted these things in me and I'm saying them.
An integration.
Absolutely. In Crete where we played and there was a collaboration with DIPETHE and the Municipality of Heraklion, the people were completely moved, because they consider him their own great man, there is also a visual resemblance to Kazantzakis and I kept hearing them say "as if he came out, came alive and he was talking to us". I heard this all the time. And in the big show - after the invitation from the culture sector of the European Parliament, we played in Brussels - in the permission that the Municipality of Heraklion got from the KAS and we played in the tomb of Kazantzakis, which is normally forbidden - without a ticket and with some guests - it was very touching. The archbishop of Crete was there and saw the performance. At the end when I say "grandpa, I've found you well" and I walk, I walk back to meet him, then some people say to me "we thought he came out of the grave and walked". You understand how shocking this is. When you do something with truth and self-sacrifice and without calculating anything – because I have no help from anywhere, there is no ministry of culture or anything, I do all this by myself – when you absolutely believe in what you are doing, the gift you are given is enormous, because nature and god - whatever you want to believe - has justice. There is justice in the truth. He has justice in him who offers. She will repay him in some way.
You reminded me of a phrase by Kazantzakis from Asceticism, "Love the responsibility, say I, I alone will save the world. If it gets lost, it will be my fault." After that, surely there is justice and retribution.
Sure. Exactly that. 'Get up, fix things, don't stay idle', that's what he wants to say. Or the great phrase in the Report: "but of one thing I have been certain throughout my life: that one road, only one, leads to God. The hillbilly. Never the downhill, never the paved road." Only the hillbilly, eh? what a great phrase! And this battle within us, because good and evil fight within each one, no one was born a saint – and the saints went through processes. When he says "to be freed from the darkness within me and to make it light... good and evil, light and darkness, were fighting incessantly within me", doesn't this happen to each one of us? Every day we fight.
Kazantzakis asks El Greco for his attitude, his thoughts and his actions. Does the modern Greek ever ask for the wish from the generations of our ancestors, the historically accomplished or not accomplished?
Well done to those who do – always know that the pioneers were few. There are few, because history is written by the few. Because they are bold. There is a river running and most people enter that river, lie on their backs and go. And there are some who go against this river. They write history. They stay.
Because they are aware of our position in life, respect for what we live, but also for what we leave for posterity.
So. And they tell you "try, do, make the impossible possible". For me, this is a rule of my life. When I first started with this stuff, because it's hard to take a whole text and go out and say it – it takes months of rehearsals, I was learning the words even in my sleep. I was sleeping and my mind was working, saying words. And I learned that there is no such thing as "impossible", there isn't. You can do things. The first time I went to the holy mountain to see this at a young age, I said to myself where the monks were gathered "is there anyone who can cross the line"? It was as if I had written it on the kutelo, because the monk I went to and stayed with sent me exactly this, as if I had asked for it, while I had not said anything. I went to an old man who had transmuted the injustice done to him by the stewardship there, into love. Falling into the greatest mystery, that of silence, with a smile from ear to ear, a happy man who had done him the greatest injustice. They were closing his cell, a cell with 300 years of history, and instead of getting angry and taking out what each one would take out, he transformed it into love. I mean, I saw it. So that's what I try to do as much as I can, that's why I live here, I walk, I exercise every day, I read a lot, I listen to music - so that I can be in biological, mental and technical readiness to be the best me little by little, with all this, the people who watch me in the theater or in my life become better too.
And what is love after all? Is this what Aristotle was saying? That "excellent" is the one who does what he was born to do? When you use your powers that is? When You Are.
Sure. The point is that most of us believe that our strength reaches a certain point, we say "oh, I can't do this", "this is difficult, it can't be done". All these adults say "dare you can" about everything.
Yes, Kazantzakis also said that "if man does not reach the edge of the cliff, he will not grow wings to fly".
Exactly.
A phrase in the "Reference to Greco" says, "my soul a cry." How easily can an actor interpret the soul of a character, especially when he himself defines it as a "scream", that is, something, so big and deep?
First, he will study everything about Kazantzakis, or what others have written about him. He will collect them, so that he can interpret this man. Then, the words he will say become his own words, transfigured. They take on the value of his speech, not someone else's that he simply conveys. This is what the actor is called to do today: not to convey words but to act. Be the role. As much as possible. To overcome his limits and when he goes on stage to be the role.
I was going to ask you about that later, but now that we're talking, tell me, if you could sum up what you want to say to your students, the young actors, in a few words, what would you say to them?
What I've always said is don't let anyone castrate your dreams. We are surrounded by people who failed to move forward and carry their failure. They will sow doubt in you, that things are not fair, that something is always hidden behind. This is not true. Believe in your dreams and like the voice of Jericho you can tear down the walls that are erected in front of you, as long as you believe in it completely. And here again comes the "reach where you can't". The same is true for the actor. There are many difficulties. The question is how much you love what you do, how much it is most important to you in your life. Art wants you exclusively as its own. He doesn't want half of you. It is not shared with a partner or anything else. Art wants you 100% its own. If you want to do important things of course. Otherwise you will be a good actor, a good painter, a good, but that's it. You will not do great things, big things.
And an alternation between Kazantzakis and Markos Vamvakaris, with the performance "Kata Markon". What do these two sides have in common for Greece? The rebetiko on one side and an intellect – cry on the other?
I don't take them for granted. The commonality here is that we are talking about two people who made an incision in Greece. Kazantzakis with the intellect, the tools he gives to each one. At the show in Brussels, Glezos was the pardoned MEP, he came and hugged me emotionally and told me "I was once in the hospital ready to die, and I read Kazantzakis to get strength and courage". This is Kazantzakis. It is a life tool. On the other hand, Markos is the cut that is made for music. Before Marcos, in Greece they heard folk music and some foreign motifs that they took, waltzes and others, and added a Greek verse. Markos arrives with the Asia Minors, especially the Smyrnios - Vangelis, Papazoglou and Smyrnios live very close to him in Kokkinia - and they begin to play together. Markos says "those santurovilas, we bouzoukombalamads". These two begin to ferment and bond and the rebetiko song and the folk song begin to be written. It's the incision suddenly, a terrible incision. Just as Kazantzakis was persecuted - the Society of Greek Writers sent letters to the Swedish Academy, "don't you dare give him a Nobel" - so Vamvakaris was persecuted, persecuted, ostracized, the underworld this circle: but they made the cut. They said e.g. "we go up to Syngrou", "these are our limits". They did not go up to Athens. It was around prostitutes, Vourla in Drapetsona, most shops. And in `46, if I'm not mistaken, Hadjidakis took Markos and his company and they played in the famous Orfea cinema, above Technis. It was the first mix. And then they start counting on them and borrowing things. Then e.g. when Kuhn stages Lorca's "Blood Wedding," Hadjidakis takes the introduction from Tsitsani's "The Duchess" and plays it with trumpet at the opening.
This is very innovative for the time it happened.
But everyone borrows then, Hatzidakis, Theodorakis, everyone takes things from them.
Yes, but how much more so when you put this in Lorca and in a theater of the Athenian stage.
Of course he edited it with a trumpet, not as it was. A trumpet blast it was. It was impressive that it happened, of course. The great innovation that happened at that time in the post-war period, happened in the famous loft of Lumidis with all the intellectuals. All the greats, Gatsos, Hadjidakis, Tsarouhis, Elytis, Koun and many others, seeing that all that exists in Greece is an imitation of European art and we have nothing else besides the vernacular, create a movement - without saying it by proclamation, but each one did it. Koon takes ordinary people and puts them on stage, they were not actors, they worked in machine shops - eg. Zervos was a sailor, they were people who did other work. Why did he do that? To bring out from the artless, this art that the people carry. Tsarouhis paints the soldiers and sailors dancing zeibekiko. In the "Bloody Wedding" we mentioned before, Gatsos writes in fifteen syllables, an important reference for Lorca's poetry, he brought it "to us". That's what these important people did and brought it to the surface then. And among them, of course, Markos, who really is a shocking story. I was born and raised there, in Kokkinia, in Nice. My path may be different from one point to another, but these were the origins. The parties in my childhood, in the huge yard of the house with the big tables and the neighbors etc. This is what we heard in this refugee town that had people who had gathered either from Mikrasia or from all over Greece. I didn't meet Marco, but people who were like Marco, so all I had to do was scrape the memory and bring it to the surface. I was familiar with this. I didn't do a man I didn't know. But I knew him. I knew these people. I saw them. I talked to them. I lived them. That was the kinship I had with Marco.
I think that our life in Greece is an endless series of unions of opposites: Smyrna with Greece, West with East, tradition with modernity... I have the impression that this is the role of the Greek, to unite the opposites. If that is indeed the case, then I understand a dose of alloprosal that we carry.
Yes, because as Kazantzakis says, here is the crossroads of the world. West meets East. This is Greece, it is in the middle. On the one hand it has the pressure of the whole West and on the other it has the pressure of the East. Will he be able, he says, to succeed? "You struggle and burn together with all of humanity, but above all Greece struggles and burns, this is its fate," says Kazantzakis.
I was impressed once in Syros, specifically in Ano Syros, where Vamvakaris lived, that during the tourist season his house, which is also a museum, was closed during the day because the lady who was guarding it had thrown herself somewhere. This detail tells me a lot about the character of the Greek. Wise on the one hand, he recognizes greatness, but at the same time cruel and completely earthy.
Syros was essentially the big port, together with Smyrna. Jobs, factory, wealth, great things were created there. Ermoupoli in particular has a middle class. These people did not like Vamvakaris. On the one hand he was a Hasikli, on the other he was a Catholic. Even now I will tell you that when we did "Kata Markon", Liavas, knowing people, told us to play in Syros and the people there were negative. Until a lady who has an association of Asia Minors of Syros, on her own initiative joined the scheme and the Municipality, and that's how we managed to play in the Apollo Theater of Syros, a performance - a tribute to Markos. But they themselves there didn't want him, they were a bit negative from what we understood. Because he was carrying these two elements that didn't want them. On the other hand, Markos left Syros very young, he was a young man. Cutlet.
Let me add to the elements of the Greek something that torments him: memory. He doesn't forget easily.
Yes, because Greece is a gerontocratic country, it carries all this history behind it. The new countries, e.g. Australia, the USA, created 200-300 years ago, have the freedom, not having a long history behind, to try everything. In us here it is almost forbidden, they say to you "who are you to do this"? When we have the ancients behind, e.g. Here to be able to do something, it will be after 50. Whereas on the contrary in the US or other countries if there is an idea they will immediately say "let's see it". Here they will say "let's go, where do you know now"? It is a great burden that we carry. Very big. What to say now e.g. of the important things that have happened and been written, when all these are contained in one? To Homer. And Beckett and Tennessee Williams? If you read and study Homer, you know it all. This is a big burden on our backs and unfortunately it holds us back. It doesn't let us go forward.
We are not people of action either. That is why the Greeks who go abroad with an idea find a place to implement it there.
Yes, of course they grow outside. Here too they would like to, but here they were closed. The phrase that Lanthimos said "if I lived in Greece I wouldn't do anything" is 100% true. If Angelopoulos was recognized, he was recognized outside, here he is discredited. Therefore, to my nephew Panagiotis, who also has my name, who is 16 years old and wants to study medicine, all I say to him is "boy, when you finish medicine for good, you will leave immediately, don't stay in Greece". What shall we say now? We are a small country that produces nothing but services, with a terrible history behind it, that has no marketable value, nothing. As an actor, I have done so many things in the past, a lot of television, especially in the 80s-90s and later, many things, I have done 15 films, e.g. A stranger would live on them. I am forced to work - regardless of whether I like it and it is my biological need. But I am forced to work to live.
A message for the Florida Community now that the times are changing?
The people outside are very advanced, they really keep the traditions. You see things there that you don't see in Greece. These people are trying to keep Greece alive. You won't see that here because we take it for granted. So not having Greece close to them, they carry it, they keep it alive. For me this is very important. I heard that they get together and learn folk and folk dances. In other words, they do things that they don't do here, except in some clubs. This is touching, I really appreciate it and I hope they continue it, because just as we keep the losses of ours, our parents, alive, so we must keep Greece alive too. This reminds me of a quote from Creon when he is arguing with Oedipus the Tyrant, where he accuses him of making Tiresias say all these bad things to him, Creon takes an oath and says "to die and not be remembered". Great talk. So, this is my answer: to keep Greece alive, wherever we are.
