On-line: SNFestival RetroFuture Edition

We know. No bangin' rock concerts by the sea; no outdoor theatre for the masses; no dance parties under the stars. In the words of Bananarama, it’s going to be a cruel, cruel summer. But wait. All is not lost. The good folk of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation are stepping up to salvage the essence of their annual open-air ode to summery vibes—the Summer Nostos Festival—with an on-line edition, recalibrated for these peculiar days. 
“We’ll foresee the future, bring back avant-garde ideas and performances of years past, and enjoy the present moment, despite its strangeness. The collective result is something wonderfully new and entirely online.”

Announcing its line-up of both live and archived perfomances and talks, SNFestival has managed to pack bold present and past  ideas with big fun for a whole week. Check the full and detailed programme here and scroll down for some highlights:

• Step into the mind of leading South African visual artist and director William Kentridge, as he talks over his new multimedia operatic project Waiting for the Sybil.
• Connect the dots between 429 BC and Sophocle's Oedipus The King—where a plague kills more than one third of Athenians—and our COVID-19 impacted reality, with a live broadcast of The Oedipus Project by Theater of War Productions, featuring performances by Frances McDormand, Oscar Isaac, Jeffrey Wright, John Turturro, Frankie Faison, David Strathairn, and Public Advocate Jumaane Williams.
• Listen to some of the greatest actors around narrate short fiction stories in Symphony Space's Selected Shorts.
• Dance to the festival's live concerts, but do so by keeping one foot in the past and the other one in the future, as both archived and future concerts play out online - among them rising Nigerian star Burna Boy who will tease his 2021 SNFestival performance from his home.
• Go up against Ernő Rubik and the world’s fastest speedcubers; then marvel at cardstacker Bryan Berg and domino artist Lily Hevesh in an edit of best past illusionists: plus get a sneak preview of 2021's chess extravaganza with Garry Kasparov, Judit Polgár, John Urschel and Frederic Friedel.