Skip to main content
If Shamima Begum had a sister
SIMON PARSONS applauds a tense and thoughtful production that regularly challenges our political engagement and prejudices
Hiba Medina as Antiya in Antigone (On Strike) 

Antigone (On Strike)
Park Theatre

THIS modern, imaginative reworking of the Greek tragedy involves a British-born, Isis child bride and her sister’s desperate campaign to stop her being stripped of her citizenship and denied her time in court. The parallels to Shamima Begum’s desperate plight, still detained in a Syrian camp along with 18 other British women, are obvious.

The production centres on the political machinations of the British Conservative government in promoting this policy, while remaining true to the nature of classical Greek theatre by making the audience active participants in the process.

Set within an interactive media studio, we are asked to vote electronically on various questions relating to the issue. Our responses, in between being bombarded with reportage interwoven with political sound bites and the manoeuvrings of an ambitious home secretary, are set against the embattled reflections of the sister at the heart of the campaign.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
CLASS AND SEXUALITY: Sesley Hope and Synnove Karlsen in Laura Lomas’s The House Party / Pic: Ikin Yum
Theatre Review / 24 April 2025
24 April 2025

SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic

Lizzie Watts and Andre Squire in Jane Upton’s (the) Woman
Theatre review / 19 February 2025
19 February 2025
SIMON PARSONS is discomfited by an unflichingly negative portrait of motherhood and its trials
IT'S BEHIND YOU: The cast of A Good House, Amy Jeptha's Sout
Theatre review / 18 February 2025
18 February 2025
SIMON PARSONS applauds an insightful state-of-the-nation play that explores the growing class divide in South Africa
(L to R) Cat McKeever as Olivia's Attendant, Daniel Millar a
Theatre Review / 13 December 2024
13 December 2024
SIMON PARSONS questions whether a dark take on Shakespeare’s Seasonal comedy is in harmony with the original text
Similar stories
Foreign Secretary David Lammy ahead of the Australia-UK Mini
Britain / 9 January 2025
9 January 2025
Miles Molan, Rosie Day and Tok Stephen in When It Happens to
Theatre review / 7 August 2024
7 August 2024
SIMON PARSONS salutes drama that registers how the impact of the sexual assault ripples out through every element of a family’s existence
UNHAPPY MARRIAGE: Ofra Daniel and Matthew Woodyatt in Song o
Theatre Review / 15 May 2024
15 May 2024
SIMON PARSONS recommends a musical retelling of the Old Testament story of the sexual awakening of a young childless bride