Irene Papas
Irene Papas or Irene Pappas[3] (Greek: Ειρήνη Παππά, romanized: Eiríni Pappá, IPA: [iˈrini paˈpa]; born Eirini Lelekou (Greek: Ειρήνη Λελέκου, romanized: Eiríni Lelékou); 3 September 1929 – 14 September 2022)[4] was a Greek actress and singer who starred in over 70 films in a career spanning more than 50 years. She gained international recognition through such popular award-winning films as The Guns of Navarone (1961), Zorba the Greek (1964) and Z (1969). She was a powerful protagonist in films including The Trojan Women (1971) and Iphigenia (1977). She played the title roles in Antigone (1961) and Electra (1962). She had a fine singing voice, on display in the 1968 recording Songs of Theodorakis.
Irene Papas
Chiliomodi Cemetery, Corinthia, Greece
Greek
Film and theatre actress, singer
1948–2003
Manousos Manousakis (nephew)
Papas won Best Actress awards at the Berlin International Film Festival for Antigone and from the National Board of Review for The Trojan Women. Her career awards include the Golden Arrow Award in 1993 at Hamptons International Film Festival, and the Golden Lion Award in 2009 at the Venice Biennale.
Early life[edit]
Papas was born as Eirini Lelekou (Ειρήνη Λελέκου) on 3 September 1929,[a][4][7][8] in the village of Chiliomodi, outside Corinth, Greece. Her mother, Eleni Prevezanou (Ελένη Πρεβεζάνου), was a schoolteacher, and her father, Stavros Lelekos (Σταύρος Λελέκος),[b] taught classical drama at the Sofikós school in Corinth.[5] She recalled that she was always acting as a child, making dolls out of rags and sticks; after a touring theatre visited the village performing Greek tragedies with the women tearing their hair, she used to tie a black scarf around her head and perform for the other children.[11] The family moved to Athens when she was seven years old.[12] She was educated from age 15 at the National Theatre of Greece Drama School in Athens, taking classes in dance and singing.[5] She found the acting style advocated by the School old-fashioned, formal, and stylised, and she rebelled against it, causing her to have to repeat a year; she eventually graduated in 1948.[12]
Career[edit]
Theatre[edit]
Papas began her acting career in Greece in variety and traditional theatre, in plays by Ibsen, Shakespeare, and classical Greek tragedy, before moving into film in 1951.[5] She continued to appear on stage from time to time, including in New York City in productions such as Dostoevsky's The Idiot.[13] She played in Iphigenia in Aulis in Broadway's Circle in the Square Theatre in 1968.[14]
She starred in Medea in 1973 on Broadway. Reviewing the production in the New York Times, drama critic Clive Barnes described her as a "very fine, controlled Medea", smouldering with a "carefully dampened passion", constantly fierce.[15]
Theatre critic Walter Kerr also praised the performance. Both saw in her portrayal what Barnes called an "unrelenting determination and unwavering desire for justice".[1] She appeared in The Bacchae in 1980 at Circle in the Square,[16] and in Electra at the Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus in 1985.[17]
Politics[edit]
In 1967, Papas, a lifelong liberal, called for a "cultural boycott" against the "Fourth Reich", meaning the military government of Greece at that time.[49][17] Her opposition to the regime sent her, and other artists such as Mikis Theodorakis, whose songs she sang, into exile when the military junta came to power in Greece in 1967; she moved into temporary exile in Italy and New York.[21][50][51][17] When the junta fell in 1974, she returned to Greece, spending time both in Athens and in her family's village house in Chiliomodi as well as continuing to work in Rome.[17]
She received the honours of Commander of the Order of the Phoenix in Greece, Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres in France, and Commander of the Civil Order of Alfonso X, the Wise in Spain.[64]
In 2017, it was announced that the National Theatre of Greece's drama school would move to a new "Irene Papas – Athens School" on Agiou Konstantinou Street in Athens from 2018.[65]