Something to chew over in high heels

CHEWING gum, high heels, booming speakers and other modern plagues are seriously damaging Greece's 2500-year-old outdoor theatres and should be banned, according to the country's powerful archeological establishment. As the shows become more elaborate, with bulkier sets, high-volume speakers, and high heels clattering on the ancient marble, experts fear that theatres such as Epidavros, built 2400 years ago for men in leather sandals and relying on natural acoustics, are under threat.

Add the wads of used chewing gum that regularly stud the old terraced marble seats, requiring painstaking removal, and the Central Archeological Council has declared war on modernity. "We find ourselves regularly cleaning kilos of chewing gum from the Herodes Atticus theatre," said Kathy Paraschi, an architect working on the Parthenon restoration. "It's an amazing and awful situation," she said. "Speaking as a woman and an Athenian, I like my fashionable spiky heels." But wearing them to Epidavros is "like taking a hammer and splitting the blocks apart".

The Central Archeological Council is considering a ban on chewing gum and high heels, though the Herodes Atticus theatre on the south side of the Acropolis is made of tougher Attic marble and can better stand up to modern footwear.
Avant-garde directors are also being blamed for damaging the sites where ancient writers once performed their plays, with ever bigger sets and louder performances.

At Epidavros last month Matthias Langhoff, a German director, interrupted his production of Sophocles's Philoctetes, revamped as an anti-war play. In mid-performance he harangued his audience to denounce what he called "Greek culture-politics". The council had objected to Langhoff's large set and interpretation, which they said took unacceptable liberties with Sophocles's original text.

05.07.2008