Tuesday 5 March 2024, at 7.30 p.m., will see the national premiere at Teatro Carignano in Turin of The Girl on the Sofa by Jon Fosse, the Norwegian author awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2023.
The text is translated by Graziella Perin. The direction is by Valerio Binasco, Artistic Director of the Teatro Stabile di Torino, who will perform with Pamela Villoresi, Michele Di Mauro, Giordana Faggiano, Fabrizio Contri, Giulia Chiaramonte and Isabella Ferrari.
Valerio Binasco is acknowledged as the leading Italian interpreter of Jon Fosse, having always been fascinated by the introspective poetry that runs through each of his texts and by the almost Proustian relationship that the Norwegian master's works trace between past and present. This plot has its narrative focus on a middle-aged woman intent on painting a portrait of a girl sitting on a sofa. She fights against doubts about her own artistic capabilities and the recurrent image of that sitting girl that persecutes her. That girl is none other than the portrait of herself as a young woman, disturbed by a thousand uncertainties. Binasco, joined by a cast of great performers, tackles the way in which emotional wounds never fully heal.
The following two productions are in the hands of Leonardo Lidi, TST's Resident Director, who will be directing Medea, from Euripides, and Stéphane Braunschweig, who will be performing a touching text by Luigi Pirandello.
From 2 to 21 April 20024 at Fonderie Limone Moncalieri Leonardo Lidi will direct Medea, from Euripides, one of the crudest and most ruthless tragedies of antiquity. Medea, a key character in classical literature and a timeless symbol of female sorrow, is the one who abandoned her own homeland to follow a man, who made her mother only to abandon her for a younger woman, in the name of her own gain. Medea has no place or family to return to, rejected because she is in opposition to a personal and political project, that of Giasone, which rules out pity and sentiment. Two worlds fated to a fatal collision, two entirely different visions of the world - male and female - that make this tragic tale as relevant and necessary as ever. The show is starring Orietta Notari, Nicola Pannelli, Valentina Picello, Lorenzo Bartoli, Alfonso De Vreese, Marta Malvestiti, sets and lights Nicolas Bovey, costumes Aurora Damanti, sound Giacomo Agnifili and is produced by Teatro Stabile Torino - Teatro Nazionale
From 9 until 28 April in national première at the Teatro Carignano in Turin, Stéphane Braunschweig, one of the leading directors of the contemporary theatre stage and Artistic Director of the Odéon - Théâtre de l'Europe in Paris, will direct La vita che ti diedi, by Luigi Pirandello. The Director deepens his link with Pirandello's writing: after the international successes of Vestire gli ignudi, Sei personaggi in cerca d'autore, I giganti della montagna and Come tu mi vuoi, he directs this new play for the Teatro Stabile di Torino.
Written in 1923 for Eleonora Duse, La vita che ti diedi is the great dramatist's most poignant text on the theme of motherhood and mourning. "How can a mother survive the death of her son?" the playwright asks himself. Simply by claiming that he is not dead. Or, more accurately, by pretending that he is alive. Pirandello makes our certainties, our preconceptions falter: despite knowing that reality will eventually put a stop to the illusion, he makes us realise how much we need illusions - but conscious illusions and not the lies we tell ourselves - to remain standing. How much we need theatre to face life.
On stage Daria Deflorian, Federica Fracassi, Cecilia Bertozzi, Fabrizio Costella, Enrica Origo, Fulvio Pepe, Caterina Tieghi, costumes and collaboration on sets Lisetta Buccellato, lights Marion Hewlett, sound Filippo Conti. A Teatro Stabile di Torino - Teatro Nazionale and Emilia Romagna Teatro ER T / Teatro Nazionale production
Cover photo: (c) Virginia Mingolla
