Translated and adapted by Frank McGuinness, directed by Firenza Guidi. Performed by Laura Bencini
Director Firenza Guidi translates and presents the Italian premiere of a play by Irish playwright and poet Frank McGuinness, considered one of the most brilliant and prolific contemporary playwrights. A hallmark of McGuinness’s dramaturgy is bringing to light the unspoken and uncomfortable dynamics inherent in the values of conventional society to reveal its distortions and contradictions. In this, his work finds a connection with Guidi’s own practice; she worked with him in 1986, participating in the workshop that led to the creation of the play *Cartaginesi*.
Written in 1985, the monologue BAGLADY addresses themes such as loneliness, marginalization, abuse, and the denial of oneself and one’s past through the voice of the protagonist—a homeless woman who carries the remnants of her life wrapped in plastic bags.
Firenza Guidi’s directorial vision focuses on the drama written by McGuinness, steering toward an exploration of madness—a theme the director has been addressing for three years through the project LA RAGIONE E IL SUO ROVESCIO, which involves examining various forms of induced madness. Guidi engages with madness to uncover its language, its secret grammar, in order to define the subtle boundary separating alienation from reason and to ask whether, as in the case of the ragged heroine of BAGLADY, madness is nothing more than the only, desperate way to survive a dysfunctional and pathological normality.
With BAGLADY, starring Laura Bencini, we inaugurate the first stage of the ACTOR’S STUDIO, a series of brand-new monologues—unpublished or never before translated or presented in Italy.
The Actor’s Studio takes its name from Lee Strasberg’s famous New York school, where in the 1950s such renowned actors as Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, and Marilyn Monroe studied. With this fascinating new initiative, Firenza Guidi aims to open the Frantoio to a new type of programming designed to give actors with extensive experience the opportunity to engage with new artistic exploration and performance challenges.
The new pieces on the program aim to bring to the public the voice, body, and experience of actors who also come from the Frantoio’s permanent school, creating events that serve both as training and experimentation for the performer and as an opportunity for everyone to discover unpublished texts and contemporary authors. The performances associated with the ACTOR’S STUDIO move in parallel with the Performer Training School that Il Frantoio is promoting for the 2011/2012 season, which this year focuses on the comprehensive training of the individual performer.
When
October 29, 2011
9:30 PM
Where
Il Frantoio, Parco Corsini – Fucecchio
Admission
5 euros
Contact
For more information, send an email to info@elanfrantoio.org or call 0571 261143
