ANTIGONE: UNMASKED World Premiere to Open at Lumen Rep Theatre
Brian Niece's adaptation closes the Jacksonville company's 2026 season, Challenging, at Church of the Good Shepherd.
Lumen Repertory Theatre will present the world premiere of Antigone: Unmasked, a new adaptation of Sophocles' classic tragedy written and directed by Brian Niece and developed by the Lumen Rep Team, as the third production of its 2026 season, 'Challenging.' Performances run October 9 through October 24, 2026 at Betsy Lovett Hall, Church of the Good Shepherd, with tickets on sale beginning August 31.
Sophocles' tragedy of Antigone, who defies the law of the state to bury her brother, has stood for twenty five centuries as a reckoning with the cost of conscience under power. Lumen Rep's original adaptation transplants that reckoning into an unnamed country close enough to recognize; a place recovering from civil war, governed by a leader who has mistaken order for justice, and watched throughout by a chorus of citizens who never quite look away. The production stages the story across three distinct playing spaces: an elevated stage of official power, a threshold ramp of negotiation and witness, and a circle of truth and human consequence, inviting the audience to sit inside the story as citizens of the country.
Lumen Rep's production features Zonnetta Marie as Chorus, Maggie Cox as Antigone, Kate McManus as Ismene, Noah Bennett as Haemon, and Eugene Lindsey as Creon, alongside the five member Lumen Rep NEXTGEN Apprentice Company in ensemble roles as the masked citizens, journalists, aides, and guards who populate the world of the play.
'Antigone has never really left us,' said Brian Niece, Playwright and Producing Artistic Director of Lumen Repertory Theatre. 'Every generation gets its own version of Creon, someone who decides, gradually and almost without noticing, that the machinery of order matters more than the people inside it. This adaptation asks an old question in a new voice: what do we owe to the truth, and what does it cost to say it out loud. For a season built around the theme 'Challenging,' there is no more fitting piece.'
Antigone: Unmasked also marks a milestone for Lumen Rep's NEXTGEN Initiative, with the launch of its inaugural Apprentice Company. The five apprentices cast in this production have trained in the company's core artistic vocabulary, including the Suzuki Method and Viewpoints, and take the stage in significant ensemble roles alongside Lumen Rep's professional company.
Antigone: Unmasked is also Lumen Rep's fifth original production in four years, following ShakesBeer, No Exit (original adaptation), Theatre in the Park, and Harlan & Bronna Jump Out the Window. That body of original work has taken on a life beyond Jacksonville, with productions and inquiries from companies as far away as Los Angeles and Miami, and continued interest from regional theatres beyond Florida.
As with all productions in Lumen Rep's 2026 season, audiences are invited to continue the experience after each performance at our Afterglow, the company's informal post-show gathering space for conversation and connection. Concessions remain open and patrons can mingle and converse with cast and creative crew.
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