Teach me how to leave, written by Akis Dimos, performed by Bijoux De Kant, directed by Giannis Skourletis

Agni is the owner of a hotel built near the ruins of an ancient palace. Her brother, Ion, is the roommate, ally and rival of hers. A mysterious anonymous Man returns years after a stormy, romantic night that he had spent at the hotel. An almost romantic entanglement, an unsolved murder and a violent, utterly irrational separation. A unique intertextual game with the return of Homer’s Odysseus to his Penelope. Surreal echoes and prosaic realistic elements, colloquial dialogues and lyrical digressions, passionate glances and blind caresses. Rain, stray dogs howling, gunshots, the song “Ela gi appose” by Christos Chairopoulos, a display case with mementos of forgotten romantic encounters, a stack of old opera recordings, the memory of Hedda Gabler, a shelf of worn travel guides… The original and unpublished work by Akis Dimou, “Teach me how to leave”, is a categorically unconventional piece that flirts with the now-forgotten genre of boulevard theater, psychological chamber drama, mystery stories, and old romantic novels sold at kiosks. And while it dreams of being a drama, it firmly holds the hand of comedy.

As director Giannis Skourletis states, “The characters in the play are tempestuous, impetuous and at the same time tender, with a raw poetic quality that makes them profoundly impactful. They bring to the stage the truth of their era. They live life without describing it, they praise it without sanctifying it, and they judge it without condemning it. ‘Teach me how to leave” is a song about loves that are lost and those that are about to come, about dreams that have faded and those that are born. About our defeats and victories through time. An Odyssey whose destination is an illusion.