The article describes the performance of Kostis Palamas' play Trisevgeni at the National Theatre of Northern Greece in Thessaloniki in 1963. It reviews the position of this crucial staging in the overall history of the performances and perception of the play, and it disputes the characterization of a "milestone for a first successful phase" used today for this particular staging. The paper is based on a thorough new study of the criticism, evidence, and testimonies of the time. The article investigates the choice of the director, Socrates Karantinos, to stage the play according to the will of the author, verbatim, without a single word of its text cut out. It also tries to integrate this staging within the general theatre atmosphere of the 1960s. In addition, it attempts to study the case of Karantinos as a key factor in the National Theatre, a person who determined the nature of many of the new theatre's performances, if not its entire identity. Τhe paper further examines the relationship between the director and progressive academic circles at the University of Thessaloniki, the perception of Palamas' poetry and literary work, and, finally, the conservative director's turn to totally outdated practices.