Antigone is a Greek tragedy written by Sophocles in some time between 442 and 440. This is considered to be one of the last plays he wrote. Antigone is a textbook example of how to develop one short episode from a myth-story to a full-scale tragedy articulating universal themes and meanings, now this was done by having the revolutionist being a female character which was rarely seen but due to the fact that Antigone was still played by a man some historians believe it did not have as much of an impact on the society as Sophocles had hoped. Along with this being an early example of David and Goliath as the small weak character of Antigone stood against the king of Thebes Kreon. Sophocles was able to use this to his advantage as the audience was expecting Antigone to fail a lot more than she actually did.
Within the specific scene that we were given was a conversation between Kreon, Antigone and Ismene where Kreon is confronting Antigone about her treason, during which, Ismene walks in. Kreon is filled with fury, to show this we had Kreon originally circling her like a piece of meat. Until I decided that Kreon, as the king, would attack her so we changed it to having Kreon pushing her towards the ground to show his dominance over her. This also showed the audience that Kreon is the one with the power in this scene from a very early stage. After this, we move towards Kreon accusing Ismene which, once again, shows that Kreon is a very powering and physical character. Within this, we also develop Antigone and Ismene’s relationship by having Antigone rush to help Ismene but Kreon stops her, proving his ability to divide them while also showing that he is always in control and if not, quickly puts himself in a position where he is.
After Ismene admits to her crime, Kreon moves to the left side of the stage while Antigone and Ismene have a conversation and use small touches to display how close they are as sisters while Kreon, whom at this point is still on stage left, is insulting both characters with gestures showing that Kreon has absolutely no love for the women who are in his company. After a brief conversation between Antigone and Ismene, Kreon steps in to reassert his control in the situation by discrediting what both Antigone and Ismene have said by calling them ‘completely mad.’ This develops into a conversation between Kreon and Ismene where Ismene is trying to get through to Kreon but Kreon shuts her out and, for the majority of the conversation, doesn’t even acknowledge her existence.
During this, Kreon says, “Absolutely: there are other fields for him to plow” which shows a very sexist and careless king who sees women as meat and nothing else. However, while this is happening Kreon is slowly losing his composure and after Antigone attempts to strike Kreon when he calls her worthless, she spits on him. In this small moment before Kreon’s next line, Antigone is in control and has all of the power. For the first time in this scene, Kreon is not in control and as a solution to this, Kreon bellows at Ismene to get her to stop. He then turns on Antigone like a viper and pushes his presence and power towards her and orders his guards to take them both in.
In Kreon’s final line, he steps towards the audience, breaking the fourth wall, he stares at a single member of the audience, and in a vile, cruel, calm manner states, “Even the bravest will cut and run once they see death coming for their lives.” This has multiple effects, the first being it truly shows Kreon as the one in control alongside the connotations that he himself is death or controls death. The second is that it sends a ripple through the audience which makes them feel uncomfortable which, again, shows how Kreon holds so much power but finally, it shows Antigone and Ismene that no one shall escape the wrath of Kreon.
