From 18 to 21 June 2025, The Coronet Theatre in Notting Hill presented a theatrical experience that redefines a classic: Satoshi Miyagi’s internationally acclaimed adaptation of Euripides’ Medea, set not in ancient Greece, but amidst the elegance and turmoil of late 19th-century Japan.
Image Credit: The Coronet Theatre, photo by Tamuka Uchida
Step into a world transformed, where the clink of sake cups and the gentle glow of lanterns give way to one of drama’s most powerful stories. Medea at The Coronet Theatre offered an evening of heart-stopping artistry and raw emotion, bridging centuries and cultures to deliver a legend reborn.
Four nights at The Coronet Theatre, 18 to 21 June 2025
Medea played for four nights only: 18 to 21 June 2025, 7:30pm, at The Coronet Theatre in Notting Hill. Tickets ran from £20 to £60, and every performance sold out. Due to the mature themes (including scenes of infanticide), the show was recommended for ages 12 and up.
The production marked SPAC’s first UK visit, a rare opportunity for London audiences to experience one of Japan’s most innovative companies and a globally celebrated director.
A Tragedy Reimagined
Image Credit: The Coronet Theatre, photo by Tamuka Uchida
This is not the Medea you remember from textbooks. Visionary director Satoshi Miyagi, Artistic Director of Japan’s renowned Shizuoka Performing Arts Center (SPAC), reimagines Euripides’ classic tale through the lens of Japan’s Meiji era. In his hands, Medea becomes more than a myth; she is a foreign woman in an inhospitable land, a wife discarded, a mother driven to extremes by betrayal.
Miyagi’s production frames the story as a play-within-a-play, unfolding in a traditional Meiji-era restaurant. Here, well-to-do men in Western suits summon female performers to enact the tragic legend for their entertainment. The effect is both intimate and provocative, forcing the audience to confront the uncomfortable truths at the heart of the story, betrayal, oppression, and the haunting legacy of empire.
By setting Medea in a period marked by rapid modernisation and strict social hierarchy, Miyagi offers “a searing critique of nationalism, gendered oppression, and colonial violence,” making this ancient tragedy feel urgently contemporary. The universality of Medea’s plight, a woman pushed to the edge by those who would silence her, resonates powerfully in this Japanese setting.
Tradition and Innovation: The Miyagi Signature
Image Credit: The Coronet Theatre, photo by Tamuka Uchida
Miyagi is celebrated for his inventive theatrical style, and Medea is no exception. Each character is brought to life by two actors: a male “speaker” gives voice to the role, while a female “mover” embodies it through stylised movement. Inspired by Japanese forms like bunraku puppetry and kabuki dance, this technique lends the production a haunting beauty, evoking the ways in which women’s voices have so often been controlled or suppressed in patriarchal societies.
The title role is played by the exceptional Micari, whose portrayal, paired with a male counterpart, lays bare both the vulnerability and ferocity of Medea. The ensemble, drawn from SPAC, includes Kazunori Abe, Yoneji Ouchi, Yuumi Sakakibara, Yuya Daidomumon, Miki Takii, Momoyo Tateno, Soichiro Yoshiue, and more, all performing under Miyagi’s direction. Music by Hiroko Tanakawa and dreamlike lighting complete the sensory experience.
Described by the creative team as “breath-taking visual symbolism, traditional music, and a form-defying performance,” this production fuses tradition and experimentation in a bold, postcolonial feminist retelling.
A Feast for the Senses
Image Credit: The Coronet Theatre, photo by Tamuka Uchida
Visually, the show is a spectacle: elegant period costumes, choreographed tableaux, and props that echo both ritual and sorrow. Silken curtains of water and light transform the stage, while each movement and gesture is rooted in Japanese theatrical tradition. The live music, performed in the style of a kabuki orchestra, heightens every moment, from the ominous drums of vengeance to the mournful melodies of loss.
Although performed in Japanese, English surtitles by Japan Society made the poetry and tension of the story clear to all. The 80-minute running time (no interval) made for a concentrated, uninterrupted immersion into the world of Medea.
Contemporary Relevance
Image Credit: The Coronet Theatre, photo by Tamuka Uchida
What makes this Medea so compelling is its layered storytelling. By making the performers geisha-like figures, acting for the pleasure of powerful men, Miyagi comments on the dynamics of the “male gaze”, yet these women, in retelling Medea’s rage and grief, reclaim their voices and agency. Medea’s place as a foreign wife underscores themes of xenophobia and otherness, an outsider in both myth and Meiji Japan.
The emotional impact is visceral. Audiences are left breathless by the depth of Medea’s sorrow, the choreography of her pain, and the show’s unforgettable finale. This is theatre that stays with you, raising questions about love, power, and justice that feel as urgent today as they did in Euripides’ time.
More from Satoshi Miyagi and SPAC
Miyagi’s Antigone opened the Festival d’Avignon in 2017, the first work from Asia chosen to do so. Our profile of Satoshi Miyagi covers that production and the rest of his work with the Shizuoka Performing Arts Center.
