Saturday's one-night, sold-out performance stars Italian soprano Anna Pirozzi, who told AFP she intends to make the role her own in the 2,500-year-old amphitheatre renowned for its exceptional acoustics."I don't want to copy, I don't want to imitate" Maria Callas, Pirozzi said in her dressing room shortly before the dress rehearsal on Thursday."I love (...) how (Callas) interprets the role. I took a few gestures she used in 1961 because I think they're very dramatic," the 51-year-old added.This lyric tragedy, in which Medea, a figure of Greek mythology consumed by fury and despair, kills her children, opens the 2026 edition of the Athens Epidaurus Festival. The 1797 opera by Luigi Cherubini, inspired by Euripides's tragedy, was plucked out of oblivion by Callas's performance at the time.Medea director Panaghis Pagoulatos said Callas and Pirozzi "share the same truth in their singing, in their acting.""But they are not at all the same personality, not at all the same voice," he said.'Legendary' performanceGreek National Opera director Giorgos Koumendakis said the 1961 production was "legendary" and "sparked immense enthusiasm" far beyond Greece.
Italian soprano Anna Pirozzi (R) and Greek operatic baritone Tassis Christoyannis perform © Aris MESSINIS / AFP
