Yorgos Karamalegos’s passion for performance has taken him all over the world. There are many places he can call home, and Liverpool has a huge part to play in his story so far.

A graduate of Hope Street Ltd and co-founder of Tmesis Theatre and its annual PhysicalFest, more recently he has starred in an award-winning film and made a new start in LA. And the future is looking bright…

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NOW splitting his time between London and Crete, heading back to the “shelter” of his Greek homeland after 16 years has come with a professional change of direction for actor, director, and acting coach Yorgos Karamalegos. “Every time I come back to Crete, it is a process of decompression from all the stimulation in the city, a space to consider the next project,” he says. Most recently, he has been inspired to swap the stage for the silver screen; and it was not long before he was offered a role in what was to become one of the most successful movies in Greece last year.

Acclaimed wartime drama The Last Note (pictured right), from acclaimed director Pantelis Voulgaris, is based on the true story of the execution of 200 members of the Greek resistance by Nazis in 1944. It won four Greek Film Academy Awards and made almost as much at the box office there as blockbusters like The Last Jedi.

It has yet to receive a Europe-wide release but is expected to make it onto the film festival circuit this year. “I couldn’t be happier having such a cracking comeback,” Karamalegos, 41, says of returning to life in front of the camera. And now, with such a positive experience under his belt, he has now started spending time in LA for more.

He says: “I was invited to teach acting in the States last autumn, so I extended my journey and spent two months in LA to get a feel of the city, see friends, and to check out the acting industry, and I got really inspired. It is a great place to be, and a lot of my favourite work is being produced there.”

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IT’S an international career that in many ways can be said began in Liverpool. Athens-born Karamalegos moved here from London in 2002. “It was my passion for movement and physical theatre that got me thinking about moving to the UK in the first place,” he says.

The acclaimed Hope Street Ltd – which helped the fledgling careers of luminaries such as Olivier-winning Josette Bushell-Mingo and countless others, and has sadly recently announced its intentions to close after 30 years after losing its Arts Council funding – enabled him to learn from the likes of Told by an Idiot, mask theatre experts Trestle, and mime artist Rowan Toley. And there, he met fellow student Elinor Randle, their working relationship going on to form Tmesis and establish the city’s international PhysicalFest.

Together they spent a decade creating work and travelling the world with their shows, “a great collaboration,” as he describes it. “There was an undoubtable chemistry between us on stage. We understood each other well, and complimented each other’s ideas and vision.”

Illustrious companies such as Peepolykus, Complicite and Pina Bausch Tanztheater helped Tmesis to develop their work; their piece Amina was commissioned as part of the 2008 Capital of Culture year programme; and PhysicalFest – a festival of performances and workshops involving acclaimed physical theatre practitioners from around the world – was the only event of its kind in Europe.

For this writer, coming into contact with Tmesis in those earlier days was not only a gateway to and education in a new style and language of performance, but a gift of discovering one of the most exciting and intriguing companies working in the city. Their spellbinding and intoxicating piece Tmesis was simply astounding. The Dreadful Hours (pictured left), performed in the Everyman in 2009, was impeccably artistic, yet relatable and funny.

But after that, Karamalegos made the unexpected decision to move on. “Things were going so well,” he admits, “but I was questioning everything. I believed that I was done with the arts.”

It was not the end for Tmesis however, which continues to thrive under Elinor Randle’s artistic directorship. The company expanded, producing and touring recent shows including That’s Amore and Happy Hour, and PhysicalFest has grown to incorporate street performance, family events, year-round collaborations and more.

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AFTER leaving Liverpool Karamalegos headed back to London, where he reconnected with the work of iconic choreographer Pina Bausch, and, in time, his passion for his work came flooding back. “I felt my heart beating again for my love for performance,” he says. “It was a massive relief – however something had changed, and I started exploring acting and theatre from a different perspective.”

It was a risk that paid off; he went on to set up the successful international acting school Physical Lab in major cities including Paris and New York, taught and directed at the likes of LAMDA and RADA, and worked with such acclaimed choreographers as the late Nigel Charnock – a major influence – and Jerwood Award winner Fin Walker.

But his collaborators and supporters in Liverpool still had a big part to play in his work during this period.

Among these was directing Tmesis’s first solo piece, 2012’s Wolf Red (reviewed here), which began life at the Unity and went on to win the best choreography award at the United Solo Festival in New York. Later, a labour of love which he devised and performed, Home, was supported by Hope Street Ltd and staged at the Unity in 2015 (reviewed here). A multidisciplinary theatre production inspired by Euripides’ Medea, Home was described as “a poetic hero’s journey exploring the feelings of alienation, power, love, betrayal, and freedom.”

 

As his work continues to take him around the globe at pace, Karamalegos is poised to return to London this autumn for a new production of Lorca’s Blood Wedding at the Omnibus Theatre in Clapham. “I just wish to work with the people who inspire me the most, and working with people from different cultural backgrounds is very enriching and refreshing,” he says. “It opens your mind.”

 

Photo credits:

Main image: Nadir Telhaoui

The Last Note production photo: Manolis Mavrakis

Tmesis production shot: Alexandra Wolkowicz