L’ANTOLOGIA DI SPOON RIVER
A large-scale, site-responsive devised piece, based on the Spoon River Anthology, a set of poems by Edgar Lee Masters. Performed at Valle Christi, a ruined monastery, as part of the Rapallo Festival. Co-produced by Laboratio Itinera, the Commune della Città di Rapallo and the University of Genoa.
The poems in the Spoon River Anthology were originally serialised, their author anonymous, in the Chicago Mirror over the course of 1914. They appeared on the literary page, as ‘epitaphs’ for the character of whom they spoke.
In the town of Spoon River, two characters helped define the ways that other were remembered after death: Richard Bone the epitaph writer and Jeduthan Hawley the undertaker worked to perpetuate the myth of happy lives, of American dreams fulfilled. By bringing the dead village back to life and listening to their stories, we hope that the ghosts of Spoon River, and of Valle Christi, can be set free.
Cast: Alessandra Agostini, Cristina Assereto, Francesca Assereto, Arian Cili, Lecia Cortesogno, Daniela Cirillo, Davide Cirillo, Cinzia Crismanich, Erika Falone, Francesca Giacardi, Jonathan Fitchett, Daniela Inserra, Fabrizio Levriero, Massimo Malagugini, Mirella Maselli, Margherita Merga, Ilir Myrtaj, Paola Olivari, Natalia Pessot, Lorella Ristaino, Chris Russell, Sandra Sbuffini, Fabio Sacco, Alice Salvatore, Marta Strata
Co-directors: Lisa Cagnacci, Tom Cooper
Choregrapher: Paola Dossena
Set design: Sara Corradi, Simona Maurone, Kiara Pipino, Francesco Salvatore
Lighting design: Liliana Iadeluca
Sound design: Luca Pagani
Producer: Kiara Pipino
Photographs by Tom Cooper