In the new production at the Abbey of Valserena, as in the two site-specific autos sacramentales Il grande teatro del mondo and La vida es sueno at the Complesso Monumentale della Pilotta in Parma, the sensitive actor – together with adolescent and elderly performers – becomes the central figure of the dramaturgy, of the mise en site, of the profound sense of the theological-philosophical drama. Already in the autos, the poetic presence of the figures of the Poor Man and the Man prefigured the protagonist Sigismondo in the double guise of man/child. In the drama, once again, the themes of illusion, of mortal time “from the cradle to the grave” and of “free will” are developed according to the privileged vision of innocent sensibility, of the unmediated act, of the word that presents itself as sound even before defining itself in the sense.
The spatial transposition of the multiple conceptual, emotional and moral fields manifested in the monumental Factory of the Abbey of Valserena will give plastic volume to the dramaturgical oscillation between reality and dream, between freedom and constraint, between self-determination and destiny. To interpret the complexity of the work are the sensitive actors, the historical actresses of Lenz and the child performers, guardians of an aesthetic perimeter that reclaims the cold beauty of the margin, the languid power of loss, the dry physics of pain. Through the multiple artistic forms – installations, performances, video projections, musical dramaturgies between baroque, modern and contemporary – this perturbing, noisy, disorganic, disheveled dimension will expand beyond the boundaries of the subject and will be transfused into a new common time released from conventions and social norms, necessary to imagine, or to dream, as in the case of the young protagonist, a possible poetic and political transformation of collective identity.
In Life is a Dream, the protagonist – Prince Sigismund – lives locked up in a tower, excluded from birth from the human consortium, because destined by an astral design to be evil. The father-king decides to put the young prince to the test of the world, and in order to be certain that his son is capable of pursuing good, and therefore of succeeding to the throne, he gives his son back his freedom. Temporarily reintegrated into the social game, through an artificial sleep, the prince will have to prove that he is capable of reversing his destiny. Awakening in the palace, Sigismondo reveals himself incapable of controlling instincts and desires, of behaving appropriately towards authority, of respecting norms, rules and laws, of perceiving the difference between good and evil. Thus confirming the astral omen, he will once again be condemned to confinement in the tower and to social marginalization. Only the people, in open contrast with the decisions of the king, will understand the subversive nature of the prince and will lead him to the head of the army to overthrow the old power. Experienced the bloody violence of the real and the danger of chaos, the prince chooses to absolve the sins of his father, and dissolved the human and political conflict, he decides to restore the old hierarchies putting an end to the dream of revolution.
LIFE IS DREAM
from Calderón de la Barca
Translation, dramaturgy, imagoturgy | Francesco Pititto
Installation, plastic elements, direction | Maria Federica Maestri
Music | Claudio Rocchetti, J.S. Bach
Interpreters | performers Valentina Barbarini, Frank Berzieri, Antonio Bocchi, Tiziana Cappella, Lorenzo Davini, Daniel Gianlupi, Paolo Maccini, Agata Pelosi, Sandra Soncini, Carlotta Spaggiari, Barbara Voghera; singers Debora Tresanini (soprano), Elena Maria Giovanna Pinna (soprano), Eva Maria Ruggieri (contralto), Davide Zaccherini (tenore)
Care | Elena Sorbi
Organization | Loredana Scianna, Ilaria Stocchi
Communication and promotion | Michele Pascarella
Technical care | Alice Scartapacchio, Lucia Manghi, Giulia Mangini, Luca Edoardo Moncaleano, Fulvio Galvani, Marco Cavellini, Fabrizio Fini, Elisabetta Zanardi
Production | Lenz Foundation
Project for Parma 2020+21 Italian Capital of Culture
Gazzetta di Parma, 26 May 2021
