Yannis simonides biography
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Performed in seventeen countries so far—festivals, universities and theatres—in 2015 performances are planned from 27th June until 19th July and is expected to attract over 2000 viewers of all ages.
Starring and co-directed by the Emmy Award Winning actor and scholar Yannis Simonides, he gives us some insight.
Born in Constantinople, raised in Athens and educated at Yale in the United States, you are truly an international, Mr.
Simonides…but where do you feel your roots really lie?
Absolutely and fully in Greece, on every rocky path I have traversed, in every harbour I have anchored in, every sprig of thyme I have inhaled, every amphitheatre I have been graced with, every modern Odysseus I have encountered
Whilst your tour a lot worldwide, have you ever spent an extended period of time living and working in Athens?
First presented by EllinikoTheatro in New York in 2004, it has since been performed to great acclaim at the United Nations, the Athens Agora, the NBC Today Show, and in over 440 venues the world over. He is a Fulbright Scholar and a Yale-trained actor, director, producer, writer and teacher (BA, MFA). What has been your experience?
I have and quite often, and now I have a pied-a-terre in Psyrri, facing the Rock, listening to bongos and santouri all night long, taking in the fantastic graffiti, agonizing with the rest of my compatriots, performing in English and Greek for my fellow citizens and the citizens of the world, this 69 year old wandering minstrel could not be happier and more privileged
You’ve been performing Socrates Now for 10 years.
He has served as professor and chair of the New York University Tisch School of the Arts Drama Department, and as the executive director of Hellenic Public Radio in New York. His performance work includes plays by Euripides, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Shakespeare, Moliere, Brecht, Kazantzakis, and others, along with solo and ensemble pieces culled from the writings of Plato, Cavafy, Makriyannis, Gogol, and others.
YANNIS SIMONIDES, Artistic Director
Yannis Simonides was born in Constantinople of Greek parents and grew up in Athens. Any ideas?
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Yannis Simonides
Yannis Simonides, born in Constantinople and raised in Athens, is Fulbright Scholar and a Yale trained actor, writer, and producer (BA/MFA).
He has served as professor and chair of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts Drama Department; head of radio, film, and television at the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America; founding and managing member of the first Pan American interfaith television network (VISN); executive director of Hellenic Public Radio in New York; founder and director of EllinikoTheatro (Greek Theatre Foundation), celebrating 40 years of continuous service in the US, Greece and 20 other countries.
His credits include productions of works by Aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Shakespeare, Shaw, Buchner, Brecht, Camus, Miller, Simon, Kazantzakis, Theodorakis, Korres, Kambanelis, Skourtis and others, and of his own plays drawn from works by Homer, Plato, Cavafy, Makriyannis and Gogol.
He has received support from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, the Greek Ministries of Education, Culture and Foreign Affairs, the Prefectures of Athens, Piraeus, North Aegean and the Cyclades, the Onassis, Costopoulos, Niarchos, Tsakos and Leventis Foundations, the Ross, Mouyiaris, Monoyios, Mata, Olayan and Zombanakis Charitable Trusts, Time-Warner, IBM, Mobil, Chase Bank, Atlantic Bank, ETBA, and the Hellenic Literary and Historical Archive, among others.
He narrated the documentaries Axion Esti and Return to the Homeland for the American Public Television Network (PBS), and has been honored with an Emmy Award by the American Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for his documentary A Light Still Bright - The Greek Community of Constantinople and the Patriarchate.
He has narrated the PBS television specials Axion Esti, Visions of Greece, and Return to the Homeland, and he has received an Emmy award for producing and narrating the documentary A Light Still Bright on the Greek community of Istanbul. Since 2019, she has been a member of the Oneness Act team, as Production and Communication Director.
Yannis Simonides | Actor
Born in Constantinople and raised in Athens, Yannis Simonides is a Yale-trained actor, director, producer.
He produced and narrated 80 cultural, educational and religious documentaries for the G.O. Archdiocese of America, and he was featured in the PBS and National Geographic television series, The Greeks.
As a founding member of the International Readers of Homer, he has co-presented marathon audience participation readings /celebrations of the Iliad and the Odyssey in Chios and Kos islands; at the Athens Concert Hall; the Library of Alexandria; the Dahesh Museum and the 92Y in New York; the Maria Tsakos Foundation in Montevideo; the Getty Villa in Malibu; in Troy, Delos, Pylos, Malta, Sicily, and Ithaca; as part of the 12 Hours for Greece initiative in Brussels; and at the London Olympics — in Homeric, Modern Greek, Arabic, English, Spanish and dozens of other languages.
He has been honored by the Prefecture of Athens as Ambassador of Hellenism for his lifelong service to Greek arts and letters worldwide, and along with a group of talented young visionaries he founded Greek Theatre International, dedicated to serving as an innovative carrier of cultural diplomacy, expanding the temporal, spatial and social boundaries of Hellenic Theatre.
By summer 2020, his international hit Socrates Now(Plato’s Apology) will complete 500 performances in 22 countries, 11 languages and 150,000 spectators.
He has narrated the PBS television specials Axion Esti, Visions of Greece and Return to the Homeland, has received an Emmy Award for producing and narrating the documentary A Light Still Bright on the Greeks of Istanbul, and was featured in the National Geographic /PBS series The Greeks.
He has performed the Socrates Now (Plato’s Apology) to hundreds of thousands of audiences worldwide and touring in the USA, Greece, Ireland, Spain and the UK through 2018.
With a BA in Cultural Management at the Department of Communication, Media and Culture (Panteion University), she continued her studies in Sustainable Tourism Development through Cultural Heritage, Society, and Environment (Pantheon-Sorbonne University, Paris 1).
During her studies, she has worked as a project assistant at EMST, STEGI (Onassis Cultural Centre), and Nieuw Dakota (Amsterdam).
Since 2017 she has been collaborating with the visual artist, Aemilia Papaphilippou. He is currently at work on a theatrical rendition of Plato’s Republic and on Euripides’ Bacchae with Maori artists in New Zealand. My morality has evolved into simple ethics, my humor has gotten sharper yet gentler, my attitude more childlike, my wisdom more prudent, my joy in life more delicious, my peace with my mortality more genuine; though, unfortunately, my Socratic determination to change the world has gotten out of hand and something needs be done about it.
He was honored by the city of Athens as Ambassador of Hellenism for his lifelong service to Greek arts and letters worldwide.
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Current works in development include Cavafy,Poet of the City, an audience participatory rendering of general-poet Makriyannis’s Memoirs, and a dramatic adaptation of Plato's Republic.
ELENA P.
NTOSA, Producing Director
Born in 1995, Elena P. Ntosa specializes in Cultural Productions and Management.
It has been filmed by National Geographic and presented as part of the PBS/NGS documentary series The Greeks.
As a founding member of the international literary organization Readers of Homer, he has co-produced marathon audience-participation readings-celebrations of the Iliad and Odyssey in Chios and Kos in Greece, the Library of Alexandria, the University of Uruguay in Montevideo, the 92nd Street Y in New York, the Roman Odeon in Troy, the Getty Villa in Malibu and Les Halles de Schaerbeek in Brussels.
Simonides has developed a theatrical rendition of Plato’s Republic, Euripides’ Bacchae with Maori artists in New Zealand, and two cycles of classical and contemporary works titled Theatre Of Peace, and The Stones Speak.
He has performed the Apology of Socrates to hundreds of thousands of audiences worldwide.
As a founding member of the international literary organization The Readers of Homer, he has co-produced marathon audience-participation readings-celebrations of the Iliad and Odyssey in Chios and Kos in Greece, the Library of Alexandria, the University of Uruguay in Montevideo, the 92nd Street Y in New York, the Roman Odeon in Troy, the Getty Villa in Malibu and Les Halles de Schaerbeek in Brussels.