Greek actor Panos Vlachos will premiere his new stage production Alex Alexandros at the Michael Cacoyannis Foundation in Athens on November 7, 2026.
Co-written with director Lito Triantafyllou, the play draws inspiration from the disappearance of 11-year-old Alex Meskhishvili in the northern Greek town of Veria two decades ago.
The stage drama focuses on one of the children linked to the original police investigation. Now an adult, the protagonist revisits the incident through interrogations, reenactments, and fragmented memories to confront the emotional weight he continues to carry.
Vlachos anchors the performance by playing multiple adult figures from a community trying to explain, silence, or deflect responsibility for what happened. Five juvenile actors join him on stage, constantly switching roles between victims, aggressors, witnesses, and accomplices to piece together the unresolved story.
The 2006 disappearance in Veria
The production revisits one of the darkest chapters in modern Greek criminology. Alex Meskhishvili vanished in February 2006 in Veria, a provincial town in northern Greece, sparking intense media coverage and national speculation when his body was never recovered.
Police inquiries eventually focused on a group of five minors. One of the children confessed to officers that the group trapped Alex outside the Veria Town Hall, where they beat him and tripped him as he attempted to run away.
The boy fell, hit his head fatally, and remained motionless on the ground. Despite the confession, investigators never discovered Alex's remains, and a wall of silence among local residents left the case unsolved.
The disappearance remains a deeply sensitive subject across Greece, where the lack of closure and the ages of those involved shocked the public. The upcoming Athens staging brings the tragedy back into public discussion as the twentieth anniversary approaches.
Themes of violence and accountability
The creators describe Alex Alexandros as an examination of violence and male socialisation. The work highlights how young boys learn from an early age to associate strength with dominance and vulnerability with weakness.
The script approaches bullying not as an isolated clash between children, but as part of a wider culture of violence shaped within families, schools, peer groups, and the surrounding community. It also explores the boundary between personal accountability and collective guilt.
Director Lito Triantafyllidou treats the production as an exercise in theatrical memory. Interrogations, games, and reconstructions alternate rapidly, shifting the audience perspective and challenging viewers to consider the social conditions that give rise to extreme child violence.
Through this shifting viewpoint, the director transforms the disappearance of one young boy into the broader story of a town that has failed its children.
Creative team and cast
Vlachos is widely recognised in Greece as an accomplished theatre and television actor, known for taking on demanding dramatic and satirical roles on the Athens stage. In this production, he leads an ensemble that features ten young performers working in a rotating double cast.
The child roles are shared by Christoforos Kardachakis, Marios Lountzis, Dimitris Makropoulos, Antonis Margaritis, Stefanos Pelekanos, Giannis Polias, Zois Poporis, Iasonas Roussos, Nikos Sklavos, and Aristeidis Chamilakis. Five of the young actors appear in each performance.
Niki Psychogiou designed the sets and costumes, with original music composed by Alexandra Katerinopoulou and movement directed by Ilias Chatzigeorgiou. Production photography is credited to Despoina Spyrou, with graphic design by Gely Kalampaka and Tereza Tsouknou.
Antonis Kokolakis handles media communications, while Konstantina Ntantami manages production organisation for Tagaris Theatrical Enterprises, one of the country's prominent commercial theatre companies. The production team is documenting its research, rehearsals, and creative experiments on the dedicated Instagram profile @alex.alexandros.play.
Performance dates and ticket information
Alex Alexandros opens on November 7 at the Michael Cacoyannis Foundation, situated at 206 Piraeus Street in the Tavros district of Athens. The venue, founded by the renowned filmmaker Michael Cacoyannis, serves as a major centre for contemporary Greek performing arts.
General admission tickets cost €25. Reduced tickets priced at €20 are available for students, unemployed individuals, people with disabilities, and members of large families.
Advance booking is open online through the ticketing platform more.com, and telephone enquiries can be made directly to the foundation box office on 210 341 8550.
