Event Details
Oct 9 - Oct 10
Toitoi - Functions on Hastings
“Shall Rome stand under one man’s awe?”
Oceans rise, empires fall, and the history of Julius Caesar, his assassination, and the fall of the Roman Republic seems more poignant now than ever.
Painted on a canvas of absolute power, unquestioning loyalty, and escalating violence, Hawke’s Bay Youth Theatre Toi Whakaari Taiohi o Te Matau-a-Māui presents Shakespeare’s enduring play at a time when questions of democracy, and the essence of the human spirit, seem, now as then, in danger of shivering into obscurity.
Caesar’s climb to prime influence and power in a democratic state, and the conspiracy that destroyed what it sought to save, live on as a reminder to future history of the cost of absolute dictatorship, and of violent revolt.
Presented in the traverse, filtered through the lens of gender, and filled with dynamic physical theatre and combat sequences, this contemporary production of Julius Caesar spans a grappling dilemma of power and justice, liberty and duty, love and violence.