Jon speaks to the writer and actor Lakis Lazopoulos star of a unique show, "Sorry, I'm Greek" . The play is just a pretext, says Lazopoulos which is like when somebody is desperately looking for an excuse to see you. Eventually he succeeds, he adds. According to Lazopoulos, the play is just an excuse to meet up with other Greeks in the Diaspora. "Being trapped within the recent developments, I felt the obligation to take my soul on a journey and to touch another Greek that gives his own battle in another country, but his mind, his memory, his desire, is there. In Greece. I know that anyone abandoning Greece, leaves behind an emotion. This could be a mother’s affection, a love left behind or a separation… It could also be a feeling of anger towards a homeland that forces you to leave. It can also be the pain of a failed attempt. However, there is always a feeling that is born with you and stays behind and waits for you, just like a candle on a grave that we occasionally forget and the only thing it needs is just a little bit of oil in order to light again. This is how I envision our path. Like a lit candle that we forgot to light and therefore darkness enveloped us."
«Sorry! I’m Greek». Those of you, who are Greek can realize the tone hidden behind this «sorry». Foreigners might feel that I am apologizing. That we are apologizing. They made us feel guilty. Why? How did we end up being the guilty ones in this story?
«Sorry! I’m Greek». This is the Greek anatomy. Our thoughts. Our Insanity. Our Madness. Our mistakes. All of this is us. We never asked from anyone to become like us. Why do they demand that every nation become like them? We are here to defend our diversity. Not in a racist way, but to defend a simple distinctiveness. Like when someone is limping and someone is not. Let us surmise that we are the ones limping. They shouldn’t insist that we run in the same stadium. They have to let us run in our own stadium. With our own starting point. With our own culture. It’s not a matter of being assimilated. It’s not a matter of assimilating. The word European is a geographical determination. We are Europeans because we belong in Europe. Not because the Germans look like the French, the French like the Swiss, the Swiss like the Greeks and the Greeks like the Spanish... it’s like all of us together meeting at a festival and even though we arrived as individual entities, we are forced to return home resembling one another. We entered Europe as Greeks, and so we shall remain.
«Sorry! I’m Greek» is a play full of memories. Your own memories, the memories of the Greeks living in Greece, and new thoughts… These memories are interpreted through «tsolias». «Tsolias», psychologically destroyed, gives birth to the bodies, the souls, all these human beings that come to talk, to tell their story, their madness… What we demand, without always understanding why, is what any wounded man would demand∙ any wounded nation would demand: to forget what happened along with all the bad memories. He gets upset when somebody steps on his wounds, even if that somebody is not wearing any boots. Even barefoot, the ones that stepped on him in the past make him react to the sound of their stomping in the present. It’s not out of hostility. They just make his wounds scream… I am here- through my characters, through my heroes, through the way you got to know me- for the Greeks and only for the Greeks. Everyone is welcome; like the Greeks that open their doors wide to welcome one and all. But when the dance begins, only we will know the steps. And I have come here so we can recall these steps, these Greek dances. I wish that we can all get to reignite the memory of our bodies’ movement, the one we lost because our souls got tired. Each and every one of us today, can provide the necessary strength so we can re-capture our soul and lift it upward.
The future awaits us!
Lakis Lazopoulos
SHOW DATES
Samstag 26.05.2012
Kongresshaus
Zürich
http://www.kongresshaus.ch
Sonntag 27.05.2012 (Zusatzshow!)
Liederhalle - Beethovensaal
Stuttgart
London Tuesday 29.05.2012
Drury Lane Royal Theatre
London
http://www.reallyuseful.com/
Fredag 1.06.2012
Uppsala Konsert & Kongress
Uppsala (by Stockholm, Sweden)
http://www.ukk.se/
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