Press office
Camilla Rigatti
A three-year collaboration between Frantoio di Fucecchio and Liceo ‘Checchi’ comes to a successful conclusion
With the three-year cycle involving the current classes V A and B/C now complete, it is time for Frantoio di Fucecchio and Liceo Scientifico ‘A. Checchi’ to take stock and evaluate the project. Positive assessments and evaluations: after lengthy consideration by the management and teaching staff regarding the continuation of the workshop for a third year, which involves students in the entire process of preparing, organising and staging a theatrical performance under the educational guidance of the technical and artistic team of the Centro di Arti Performative (Performing Arts Centre) directed by firenza guidi, the work of the fifth-year students has shown that interest in the world of theatre is alive and well and that it is a vehicle for cultural and social education.
The audience turnout on the evening of Tuesday 7 February was among the highest ever recorded for the Auditorium La Tinaia in Fucecchio. Over a hundred people, many parents and friends, but also people who simply came to spend an evening watching a decidedly unusual theatrical production. The teachers of the “Checchi” High School were notably absent. However, Councillor Sara Matteoli was present: “I really enjoyed the show. Today’s young people have a thousand stimuli, and finding something that they are passionate about is a difficult task. But here I saw them full of enthusiasm, with shining eyes. The theatre workshop has definitely hit the mark,” was her comment. ‘We must also take into account the positive fact that those who do not feel cut out to be actors in this case were able to try their hand at other jobs that are essential to the success of a theatre show, such as set design, lighting, promotion and costume preparation. These are all activities that allow young people to discover their passions or acquire certain skills that may be useful for their CVs.’
Firenza Guidi, with her long experience around the world as a director and author, has for years been proposing an approach to the reality of the performing arts that is closer to the international way of doing theatre, with a comprehensive training technique that goes beyond the purely acting aspect, including it in an educational basis that gives equal importance to singing, stage presence and the physical expression of the performer.
HAMLET_ovvero la trasgressione (HAMLET_or transgression) was therefore a completely unique type of show, a world away from any other school theatre workshop “essay”: no actors in 16th-century costumes coming forward on stage to recite anachronistic lines, but rather a travelling set, in which the settings transcended their role as containers of physical objects to become envelopes of moods, emotions and the turmoil of Shakespearean heroes and heroines, and a psychological exploration of the protagonists was achieved through the director’s choice to have each character played by several actors at the same time, in order to better capture every facet of their personalities.
In addition to appearing on stage as performers, the fifth-year students at Checchi made and selected costumes and music, designed and created the poster for the advertising campaign, took care of the organisation and communication of the event, and independently created a Facebook page on which to exchange photos, comments, opinions, and likes.
The decision to base the production of the past three years’ shows on classical literature – Boccaccio’s Gismonda and two Shakespearean tragedies: “The Tempest” in 2011 and “Hamlet” this year – had as its common thread a series of thematic elements that concern young people of all times: the relationship between parents and children, love and the madness of love, honour and morality, being and appearing, the affinity with the existential condition of boys and girls who have always moved against a backdrop of dimensions to which they feel they do not yet belong and with which they are forced to reckon in order to build their own individuality in the future.
The young people who took part in the HAMLET_ovvero la trasgressione workshop:
PERFORMERS: Giulia Barsotti, Rebecca Bertini, Raffaella Castaldo, Tommaso Daddi, Giorgia Del Fiero, Marica Del Gamba, Gaia Dini, Francesca Donati, Eleonora Greco, Michele Lucrezia, Beatrice Molinaro, Giovanni Nieri, Luca Notarfrancesco, Angela Prifti, Stefano Russo, Emanuele Vassallo, Chiara Vitale
COSTUME DESIGNERS: Francesca Bonomolo, Lorenzo Cangini, Giacomo Carusi, Giulio Corsi, Martina Gargani, Gianluca Giuntoli, Alessio Moriani, Giulia Rossi, Cristiana Vescovi
SET DESIGN AND LIGHTING DESIGN: Federica Belcari, Federico Fagiolini, Leonardo Mancini, Lorenzo Mancini, Fernando Palazzotto, Enrico Pantani, Linda Pompeo, Gabriele Rovetini;
SOUND ENGINEERS: Lorenzo Billi, Gabriele Bonfantoni, Iacopo Giometti, Loris Moriani ORGANISATION AND COMMUNICATION: Filippo Valiani
PHOTOGRAPHY AND BACKSTAGE TEAM: Samuele Iula. Assistants: Sara Campigli, Ilaria Frediani, Vittoria Morelli, Sara Picchi, Noemi Pozzolini
Director, author and director of Elan Frantoio, firenza guidi has been creating performances, theatre shows and films all over the world for years. Much of her work is inspired by events, memories and phenomena linked to local and universal history. Through the writer-director’s working methodology, Elan Frantoio’s activities are based on the philosophy of creating and staging new dramas: new because they are unpublished in terms of texts and scenography, or new because they offer adaptations of original classics in their interpretation, or because they belong to contemporary authors who have never been represented in our country.