COMEDY IN THE PIAZZA
DATE
Thursday, October 23, 4:30 - 6 p.m
PLACE
McCormick Tribune Forum, 1870 Campus Dr.,
Northwestern University,
Evanston, IL 60208
DIRECTION
NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY CONTACT:
Thomas Simpson 847-467-1987, ths907@northwestern.edu
As part of the activities of the 2008 Settimana della Lingua Italiana nel Mondo devoted to the theme of 'La Piazza,' Northwestern University will host an interdisciplinary round-table entitled “Comedy in the Piazza,” exploring the millennial history of the piazza as the setting for comic theatre throughout the Italian peninsula from the ancient Greeks to the 19th Century.
From the first recorded written evidence to today's modern era, the piazza as "an open zone of human commerce" constituted the setting for many of history's comic plays.
From the Greek fragments of Epicharmus in the 5th century BCE to the dialect melodramas of the 19th century, the comedy of human fallibility is represented as unfolding right before the eyes of the very public that the work caricatured in the spaces afforded by the piazza, with its entrances and exits and its points of exposure and concealment.
The architecture of the piazza conditioned the entanglements invented by playwrights and performers to represent human nature at its worst, best, and most typical.
The social occasions offered by the piazza, with its inevitable alternation of chance and serendipitous encounters, provided the parasites of Plautus and the zanni of Renaissance 'commedia' the dramatic stimuli to enact the archetypal dilemmas that reflect the social status of every spectator. The piazza as a common setting of comic plays over two millennia has often been overlooked and this evening will provide the perfect setting to have a brief insight into many of the texts.
For “Comedy in the Piazza,” Northwestern professors from the departments of Classics, English, and Italian are preparing a publication of acting-oriented translations into English of great comic plays by Epicharmus, Plautus, Terence, Machiavelli, Ruzante, the Commedia dell’Arte, Carlo Goldoni, and Salvatore Di Giacomo. For the round table, each professor will briefly discuss their research and the challenges of translation with the complement of the texts coming to life. Under the direction of Italian Artistic Director Paola Coletto, Chicago actors Sean Kaplan, David Knezz, Erica Mott and Anya Clingman will perform brief selections of the translations-in-progress.
NU participants:
Professor Daniel Garrison, Dept of Classics
Asst Professor Kathryn Bosher, Dept of Classics
Francesca Tataranni, Lecturer, Dept of Classics
Assoc. Professor Will West, Dept of English
Thomas Simpson, Distinguished Sr. Lecturer, Dept of French & Italian
