Crucifiction

SYNOPSIS

Crucifixion is a contemporary Greek tragedy set in a decaying urban neighborhood where violence, poverty, and moral collapse grind relentlessly against faith, dignity, and human endurance.
At its center is Elias, a middle-aged theologian whose deep, almost monastic faith is tested to destruction.

Elias believes in a just God, in moral order, in the transforming power of Christian love. But as his neighborhood descends into lawlessness — and as his gentle family becomes the target of two drug-addicted criminals, Toni and Asteris — his faith is pushed beyond its limits.

When Elias’s wife and daughter are brutally attacked and murdered, he unravels. Police investigations falter. The world around him collapses into meaninglessness. He tries to take his own life; he wanders between church and seaside, between prayer and madness, searching for a sign — any sign — that justice exists.

When he suddenly recognizes Asteris alive and unpunished, Elias captures him and stages a horrific, symbolic re-enactment of the Passion: he tortures and crucifies the young man in an abandoned basement, attempting to force divine meaning onto a world that has ceased to have any.

But the act destroys him instead. The Dancer — a silent embodiment of the Holy Passions and of nature’s indifferent laws — shadows Elias throughout, witnessing, mirroring, and finally confronting him.

At the end, Asteris miraculously survives the crucifixion. Crawling into Elias’s home in the final moment when Elias is about to hang himself, he utters the impossible line Elias once taught him as a student: “No one comes down alive from the cross.”

And yet — he has.

This breach of logic, of theology, of nature — this “impossible survival” — forces Elias into a moment of existential collapse and revelation.
He hears, through Asteris, the echo of the Resurrection: “He has risen — He is not here.”

The play closes in an ambiguous, trembling moment between horror and transcendence: a broken man, a resurrected criminal, and a witness of the Passions share the stage in a final silent bow, leaving the audience to face the same impossible question Elias faces.

Is this miracle?
Delusion?
Grace?
Or the last flicker of a soul trying not to drown?

CHARACTER BREAKDOWN

ELIAS

Male, 50–55.
Theologian, gentle, introspective, devout. A man of deep ritual, slow speech, profound conviction. His arc drives the play: from faith, to doubt, to madness, to a final terrifying attempt at divine justice. A tragic hero of the modern world.

KULA

Female, 50–55.
Elias’s wife. Practical, traditional, protective. Represents the fragile normality Elias is losing. Her murder is the emotional breaking point of the play.

MARIA

Female, 19–21.
Their daughter. Innocent but spirited. Curious, hopeful, ready to step into the world. Her fatal entanglement with Asteris brings catastrophe.

ARTEMIS

Male, 60–80.
Corner-shop owner, amateur intellectual, Elias’s closest friend. Cynical, humane, rational. He is Elias’s anchor to everyday reality — until reality collapses.

TONI

Male, 20–30.
Leader of the local gang. Violent, unpredictable, high on cocaine and power. A portrait of nihilism: no ideology, only impulse.

ASTERIS (ASTERIOS IOANNOU)

Male, 20–30.
Gang member. Once Elias’s student. A mix of cruelty, addiction, and buried intelligence. His survival at the end forms the metaphysical rupture upon which the play concludes.

THE DANCER

Any gender.
A silent physical role.
Represents:

• the Holy Passions

• the Drop

• the Witness

• the indifferent mechanics of nature

• the echo of the divine

This performer threads through the play like fate itself — dancing the station of the Cross, mirroring suffering, guiding the audience through the symbolic layer of the narrative.