Jean-Marie Straub et Danièle Huillet

GERMANY/FRANCE, 35MM, 1.37:1, COLOR, 100′
[Opening credits]

– Il Teatro di Segesta

[Black text on white, in German]

– Die Antigone des Sophokles nach der Hölderlinschen Übertragung für die Bühne bearbeitet von Brecht 1948 (Suhrkamp Verlag)

– Film by Danièle Huillet and Jean-Marie Straub 1991

– Assistants: Michael Esser, Hans Hurch, Francesco Ragusa, Daniele Rossi, Yu-Jung Nam

– Olivier Moeckli, Stephan Settele, Stefan Ofner, Marco Zappone, Ernaldo Data

– Co-production Regina Ziegler (Filmproduktion, Berlin), Martine Marignac (Pierre Grise Productions, Paris), Hessischer Rundfunk, Straub-Huillet

– Production Manager: Danièle Huillet with Hartmut Köhler, Rosalie Lecan

– Antigone: Astrid Ofner, Ismene: Ursula Ofner

– Elders: Hans Diehl, Kurt Radeke, Michael Maassen, Rainer Philippi

– Creon: Werner Rehm

– Guard: Lars Studer, Haemon: Stephan Wolf-Schönburg, Tiresias: Albert Hetterle, Child: Mario di Mattia

– Messenger: Michael König, Servant-Messenger: Libgart Schwarz

– Costumi d’Arte Ruggero Peruzzi, Hair: Guerrino Todero, Shoes: Pompei
– Sound: Louis Hochet, Georges Vaglio, Sandro Zanon

– Camera: Nicolas Eprendre, Irina and William Lubtchansky

– Negative: Kodak 5245, [Laboratory] GeyerWerke Berlin, [Camera] Movie-Cam by Cine-Light

– Music by Bernd Alois Zimmermann conducted by Michael Gielen

[End credits]

– The memory of humanity for sufferings borne is astonishingly short. Its gift of imagination for coming sufferings is almost even less. It is this callousness that we must combat. For humanity is threatened by wars compared to which those past are like poor attempts and they will come, without any doubt, if the hands of those who prepare them in all openness are not broken. Bertolt Brecht 1952

[Handwritten]

– Thank you, thank you Marco Müller and Jean-Luc Godard

[White text on black]

– Also made with the support of the Berliner Filmförderung, the Filmförderungsanstalt and the CNC
TEXT: Brecht’s 1948 reworking for the stage of Hölderlin’s German translation (1800–1803) of Sophocle’s tragedy Antigone (441 BC) – without Brecht’s prologue. The play was performed at the Schaubühne in Berlin (premiere on May 3, 1991), then for a single performance on August 14 at the Teatro di Segesta.

MUSIC: an extract from Die Soldaten (1958–65) by Bernd Alois Zimmermann.

PRODUCTION DATES AND LOCATION: Summer 1991, 5 weeks at the ancient Teatro di Segesta (Sicily).

BUDGET: 3,000,000 F. There are two versions of the film. First version subtitled in English, second in French (by Danièle Huillet).

FIRST SCREENING: 1992 Berlin Film Festival, Panorama (February).