 Welcome everybody here on HowlRound to the Siegel Theatre Center at the Graduate Center CUNY in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It's almost dark out here. It's 4.30 p.m. and we have a special session. Today, as our listeners know, since March, we are having Siegel talks where we talk about theater and performance in the time of Corona. Since March, five days a week, now three days a week where we listen to artists, what they have to say, how they're experiencing this moment, what meaning they create and what is changing for them in that world that has already changed. And it is as a replacement for programs we do at the Siegel Center and for many years we have been part of a very significant project and it is called the Italian American Playwrights Project. And it is this third edition for the third time. We are hosting an evening celebrating Italian playwrights, Italian theater, Italian contemporary theater here in New York, playwrights who really have made a contribution to Italian writing, European playwriting and also created work that resonates in some way with us here in New York. As we often say, artists are in the moment, they can feel, experience, sees things we don't see, write about it, put it in a form, but often also anticipate the future. So they make us comfortable and they play with us and our ideas and create a forum, a stage, a space where we can discuss things, see things from different angles, understand better a point of view of someone who is kind of a sportive competition of ideas. The great playwright Michael Frehn who was once at the Siegel Center, if you write a great play, everybody is right. Whatever someone says they have reasons to and you believe them, but then still at the end, you know, there has to be a solution, something that at the moment makes most sense, and it has follows a law that perhaps even is above the law that humans have made like the great Antigone play so many have referred to the great Galileo by Brecht and many others and what we have now with us are four writers who also observe the world we live in, the universe, Italy, Europe, the world, and they tell a story which artists have done over centuries, over thousands of years, and they wrote a story. This is one of many, many stories they wrote and it became a play, a work that became notable in Italy, people liked it, and among many others, and it was nominated by quite a significant Italian advisory board, we had as always at the center, we have advisories, Italy, people say these are plays that might be of interest for you guys in America and New York and then we have an American advisory board that looks and it says this might be really good, this might be too complex, people might not understand who's Aldo Moro or something like this, so maybe that wouldn't work so much, so it is quite a significant project in Italy, we had Valeria Giabattoni from the Teatro della Sadegna, who was here Franco di Polito, if I say that right, from Tearo Stabile in Toscana, Magdalena Giornelli, and from the University in Milan, Giulia Guerra, she's the managing director of the Teatro Eberia and Graziano Graziani, who has been often at the Siegel Center, who is a theater critic and works for RAI, Sergio Lagato, a theater critic, a dramaturg, a journalist, and then the great Teatro dell'Albe, Armana Montanari in Marco Martinelli and Anna Ashton, Parmazziani, the literary agent, a famous one, an important one, yes, why not have her with us, and the wonderful actress, Isabella Ragonesi, who also once came to New York, so everybody took time to suggest plays, and so what we are listening to and the people we are encountering today are playwrights who have been suggested, and we had 15 suggestions for plays that were selected by a board of the U.S. advisory board in the Bosse Akiba, Abaka, who is at ArtsEmerson in New York, Parisi Acerra, who is at the International Voices Project in Chicago, Soraya Brokoum from the Living Theater, and these actors and the director Marvin Carlson, the great theater historian from the City University at the Graz Center, the wonderful and great and Catanio, who is the dramaturg at Lincoln Center Theater, which is more or less the National Theater of the United States, I think in some way, Thomas Simpson, who is with us here, who was the translator, we felt, why not hear also from a translator, what's his ideas, and even so of course he will fight for all the 15 plays, he this time translated the excerpts about to hear from him, Andy Lerner, Andy, who is with us here, also gave us her thoughts. Daniel Leisowitz from the Italian Study Program at Muhlenberg College has supported this program, also hosted Italian playwrights at their wonderful new program that they are creating at Muhlenberg. Helen Shaw, a significant theater critic here in New York at New York Magazine, formerly she was at Timeout New York and also at Vulture, and Dennis Yehue from the Alle Limiter Theater Collective, and so this is quite a significant group of people and those four ended up with us with a road place that Italian thought this was significant and then they were selected to say they, what they have to say somehow resonates also with us here in the US. And the names are significant ones. So let me just welcome Mimosa Campironi. Mimosa, thank you for joining us. Thank you. Mimosa family game, we have Mariano Damacco, Mariano, who did good. Salve. Yeah, Salve, good. This is what you say in Rome, we have Gabriele di Luca, and Gabriele wrote Metropolitan Miracles, and Tatiana Marta, and she wrote White Night, and they were chosen by the 12 members of the advisory board, really, really welcome. It is the third edition of the program, all plays get reading in New York, we actually also print a book with the plays, they get fully translated for the selection, we had part of them translated. It's a very significant event and it is so congratulations for all of you who this time it got selected we all know how it works with prizes we cannot have everyone is also a selection of variety of stories so all the entries just to be nominated is a very big deal by these significant panel from Italy so still congratulations to all of you who are with us and I would like to ask Valeria for all the people who might not know what is the Italian playwright project about give us a little insight. What was your idea when you created it and where are we at the moment with it. So, our idea because you are part of it is was to give a voice to the Italian contemporary playwriting in a systematic way. What we registered in six years ago five years ago was that many plays that were translated and also Tom knows because he is one of the most active translator from Italian to English. So it's not a playwriting, but there is not a system. There is not an habits to do that. So many, many plays are missed. So it's just a single decision to translate the plays and of course, with no reason to translate that there is also no reason to do that so nobody does. And this was our conversation and was five years ago when I was just arrived here six years ago when I was just arrived here and and one question was how to do that without the money that arrived from the institution because you need a lot of money. So the Siegel Center gets every every year, many nations, many countries, but every country give is on contribute to help dramaturgy and playwrightings. Most of the time, yes, at least. Yeah, most of the time, not always, but so the question was how to do how to help our dramaturgy without any funds any any any money in the in the in the cash, you know, so it was the first thought and it was the moment when I started to say okay, let's think something that will grow up if we grow up. And, and it was like this so we started with the the first edition without an advisory board, for example, we started just connecting each other, helping each other. Then we met the first four play playwrights, and then the Italian Cultural Institute arrived. And so they with the George Mastraten was the director in that moment. And he was very, very interested in decided to help the project and then we won the first grant and then we won the second grant and then we won a prize. Now, of course, I am proud of it because this is a little castle that we built piece by piece. And after the three books. Now we have eight translations, many friends around new connections with from from New York, we arrived in Chicago and then we arrived in Mulimer College and then we arrived in London, and then little by little people from all all over the world that is a English, English speaking people is interested to read the place today, for example, I had an order from for the book from the University of Michigan. No, really, it's a successful program. Something that grow up. So the meaning is, of course, to leave something good for the moment we are leading in Italy, first of all, and then in the world to spread with our own forces. Yeah, so it's just important, you know, most Americans know Pirandello they know Dario foe and often think nothing really of significance happen. Meanwhile, there is a renaissance of playwriting in Italy. And it's the Segal Center where we do many international exchanges with advisory boards with Japan, Romania, Germany, France, Mexico, Caribbean so we also have the Italian project but actually, it is a very, very good one I'm very proud of what we did. We also have with us Thomas of course the trendsetter will will come to you but now let's go to our playwrights in Italy. First of all, bonacera I think I have to say good evening. Where are you guys at the moment and how are you mimosa how are you, where are you. I am in Rome with my two cats and my boyfriend here in the second during the second lockdown. I'm locked down at the moment again in Rome. Yes, we are in the yellow zone here in Italy so we can go out until six o'clock in the evening, and then everything is closed. So are you able to write anything. During the first lockdown better. Now I feel a little depressed. It's so hard. I have a hard time even reading. How can one even even write so maybe we see one of your cats in the in the sessions or maybe both of them please do show them when you Hello. Maybe maybe. Where are you now you said Salva says that's what they say in Rome. I'm in a little town of 1000 souls in Romania on the edge near the Adriatic coast. No country right where he came from and close to Ravenna and a lot of it if I'm right. It's a lot of it's only the Dario for see you know. Okay, it's it's Fellini country and also to me know where the great screenwriter. Yeah, who we love so much and I wish I had met him one day what what a great tradition. You know, since, since thousands of years of the great down to that but also for Pasolini and other so it's a strong, strong heritage and you are all representatives and office and Gabriele. And are you listening to us. Oh, look who's there. Tell us where are you and what time is it we forget to ask the microphone or Gabriele. Can you hear us Gabriele. I spent the microphone. Okay. That's good. Where are you and what time is it. It's 11 at night I'm in Le Marquet at my family's house. I live in Varese, but that's in Lombardy, which is a very heavily, strongly locked down zone of Italy right now. I'm here with my fiancé, Olli, the Cocker Spaniel. I'm here with my fiancé, the Cocker Spaniel, Olli. I'm here with my fiancé, the Cocker Spaniel, Olli. I'm here with my fiancé, the Cocker Spaniel, Olli. Very good. Very good. Escrivo. Not a lot of fights, then. Are you writing? Are you able to write? Are you producing? Gabriel, I'm happy to write well at this time. Yes, yes. I'm not writing a dramatic text, but it's one of those moments of life where I'm working a lot with the company, with the project of the future, but I'm also taking notes, collecting suggestions, reading a lot. I'm not writing in a structural way, but I'm writing. I'm not writing a specific script, but I'm collecting a lot of information. I'm working with my company, so it's a very fertile period. Yeah, how is it for you, Mariano? Are you able to work to focus? In this strange year, I have composed a dramaturgy, because in the summer weeks, where it was possible to do theater in Italy, we managed to maintain the plan with my company to make a new show. So, in some way, during... Thomas? Yes, I've managed to. I was writing a play this because I was working with my company during the pause between the first lockdown and the second lockdown. Yes. Mariano? Yes. And then, for example, tomorrow, we'll go to Rome, because, among the things we'd never imagined to live with, with the theatrical work this year, tomorrow, for example, we'll go to a festival, it's called Teatris di Vetro, a contemporary theater festival, and we'll have a show with just some cameras that take the event and send it online. I would never have imagined to have an experience like this. Tomorrow, as a matter of fact, we're doing something I never would have imagined having an experience such as this. We're going to Rome and we're going to film one of our performances completely virtual. Incredible, yeah. You wouldn't have imagined before, yes. And so, Tatiana, where are you? I guess also Italy, but where? Yes. I'm in Milan, in Lombardy, and unfortunately, I don't have any pet. But I live with my boyfriend, and we are here. That's good enough, that's good enough. Yes, that's fine. And yes. How are you experiencing this moment, this second lockdown and all of it? Well, as Mimosa said, I find this second lockdown more depressing than the first one. I don't know, maybe the first one was such a new situation. We were living this weird and strange moment, and now I find it harder. And I'm writing a play right now, but I find very difficult to focus and to write in this moment. In the first lockdown, it was impossible to me to write. But now we went through kind of a soft lockdown. So the situation was better, but not enough, because I think to write, you need to live at the same time. So we're not actually living. So when you heard about the New York event, the readings, I think you have to be nominated. I think you cannot apply for the complex for that Italian prayer rights project. And then you got to now select it. Can you tell us a minute? Is that meaningful to you guys? What does it mean to have some kind of a New York representative? Is this another planet far away? Or do you see some connections to your work? Anyone there? No, it's a connection, it's certainly very beautiful, which, in some way, I expected, even if some of my texts have already gone abroad. For what I think are the characteristics of my writing, I mean, his will to create very universal worlds. So I think that for his nature, my poetry has a very international vision. Let's translate. Yes, for him it's a very meaningful connection. It's very nice. Other of his plays have been produced in other countries outside Italy. And he always has an intention that his plays should have a universal reach, an international reach. Here I am. Excuse me. I have always loved, of course, my writing, also very inspired by cinema, seriality, both in its structure, both in its rhythm and in its language. My theatre is certainly a very contaminated theatre and that from cinema and from seriality it has mutated many elements. So I have a lot of affinity with the writing that we practice in America. My work has always been very inspired by cinema and its structure and its rhythms and its language. And in particular, I've been very influenced by American cinema. Mimosa, how was it for you? For me it was a big surprise because I feel that we are in the same condition now. The artists all over the world are in the same condition and there's a big problem, a big question about art and technology. And my text is about this. And I want to... I want to face this problem and make technology a tool for drama and try to see what could happen. So I felt accepted. It was very nice and very exciting. Okay, well, Mimosa began by saying she's always been very interested in the issue of art and technology and then in our continuing remarks she talked about this is what her play in particular is dedicated to this theme of the interaction of basically life and technology and what this is going to mean for the future. So it was a very emotional response. That's wonderful to know. I want to add that Mimosa wrote this play during the first lockdown. It's true, it's a corona play also, though. Yes, I was afraid about my job. I thought that maybe theater... Maybe theaters will close their lives and we'll have to find a solution that is not cinema, but theater is made in another way. And so I tried to imagine what would happen if technology became an important dramatic element. Well, I thought about what if technology becomes an important dramaturgical element. That's what my play focuses on. Yeah, yeah, it's incredible that a play written in lockdown gets into competition, is translated part of it and ends up. So it's wonderful how fast that works. Normally it's years till light signals come. Mariano, how is that for you to have been part of this project or being selected? I'm happy, honored and grateful for the involvement in this project. For me, it means also the possibility to discover if my play is dramatic, if my way of building a vision, my way of using the classic references of the present, in a way... It was the way to discover if they could also speak translated into another language and brought into another culture, actually. So I'm very happy, honored and grateful. And for me, it was a chance to figure out whether or not my way of rendering theater, my way of thinking, my way of the reality I show on stage is able to be expressive also for another country, in another language and in another culture. Tatjana, tell us a bit. Yes, I'm also honored and grateful and it's a very meaningful opportunity to me. Above all, I must say it's very special for me to be in this project with this text at this moment, because this text in the center has the theme of travel. It really strikes me that you arrived in New York at a time like this in which we can't travel and we can't physically meet. Well, my play is about travel and so I'm very interested in the way that my play is traveling. My play is about travel and then it ends up being presented and read at a time when travel is prohibited. Yeah, that's true. Friends of mine who read the play in this period are telling me that it seems to belong to a world that doesn't exist anymore because we can't travel anymore. Before we come now to the place, a question to all of you, open. How is Italian contemporary playwriting? What do you guys think? What moment is it? Italian contemporary playwriting. What do you guys think? What moment is Italian in the Italian theater when it comes to playwriting? I understood. Valeria, give me a confirmation. What moment is it for Italian writers and Italian authors? Yes. Let's say this. Certainly in the last 15 years there has been a great opening up toward playwriting. It's still not enough, but it was formerly this whole reality of the world. I think it's a great opportunity for us to be able to see the world in a different way. I think it's a great opportunity for us to be able to see the world in a different way. I think it's a great opportunity for you to witness the football reality of theater. Writing for theater was very ghetto-us and held in kind of an off-off type social context. But it's increasingly opening up and institutions are opening up for theater and to play writing. She mentioned. Probably we still have a problem in the institutional level. But then so.ーヘータヘター You've got a ры. Italian, both to the country and to the outside, but I have to say that I continue to do it. There's still a lack of institutional support and institutional responsiveness to these kinds of initiatives, but things are getting better. Thank you. Mr. Gingere, can I add something about the contemporary play arriving in Italy? What I noted, as Gabriela was saying, there's an increasing, consistent increasing of play writing. And what we registered to this year, the 15 plays, were almost all good plays. And also the advisory board told us it was so difficult to decide what kind of vote to give because it was so good plays. And if, Franca, do you want to tell something about the criteria of the selection? I'll come a bit later, maybe just to hear a bit also. Is that maybe to Mimosa and Tatiana Mariano? Is this a golden age of play writing? Is it getting better? Or is it towards ensemble work? What's happening? Well, how do you see it in Italy at the moment? Ah, OK. This is a very interesting observation about this a deep division in Italy, between people who write with a theater, with a company at their back and who write for actors and people who write in a really detached from the reality of an acting company. Is that what you were saying, basically, Mimosa? Yes. Yes, I know the Tatiana works. I don't read nothing. But I know that she is totally pure. For example, I know that Tatiana's work is totally pure. That is to say, she's not coming from a company. So that is to say that Tatiana is a playwright in the, you might say, the traditional English sense. In a way, she stands away from the theater and does her writing, whereas work like Gabriele, sorry, has a very interesting company behind him. So he's working much more in an active context of collaborating with actors. Yes. And my job is I work in music also a lot. So I work in music and dramaturgy and I put it together. So my job is always born from practice, but from something different. We Italians have the independent theater, which is what makes us act, and then a more academic theater that they have to learn to dialogue. So in my opinion, for example, Mimosa is saying that she works a lot with music. And so she thinks of playwriting very much as connected to music as her practice. And that world has to find more of a bridge to a more academic approach to theater and composition. We've lost Gabriele a moment. We'll be back. Any, or we can move on, Tatiana, Mariano, is something you want to add? Yes. I was formed in a school, in a theater academy. I was formed as a dramaturge in a school where there are courses for actors, for recitation, for directing, theater, and for organizing and for dancing, as well as for dramaturging. So I was formed in an academic context. I went to a school of the dramatic arts, really an academy, and I studied to be a playwright. And in this same school, there was courses, a curriculum designed for actors, for directors, for dancers, and for playwrights. I think this is a situation with a more respect to the painting that Mimosa gave us, in the sense that the authors in these contexts, in this kind of school, work as pure authors, but always in contact with the actors, always very close to the stage, which is different from an purely academic experience. So that school situation is kind of a mixture, really, of an academic setting with a practical setting, because as playwrights, we work together with actors continuously, and directors and designers. Yeah. So thanks to my school and other similar schools, every year, my school produces a whole crop of very talented young writers who go out into the world. The problem still is finding the means to produce their plays, finding institutions, finding companies, finding structures that are able to put their plays actually on stage. And this is really just one aspect, and we're not even mentioning the whole reality of Italian theater, of ensemble companies that develop their own work, similar to... Mr. Gabriela, Mr. Gabammariano, how do you, where do you fit in, in the Italian theater system? Is it open for playwrights? Is it an inspiring field at the moment for you? How do I find you? No, yes, I appreciate the translation. But how do I find you in this context? Do I find you in a place for yourself? Do you feel encouraged? I'm part of that experience of composition and dramaturgy related to the stage, which doesn't mean I don't do dramaturgy written in Tavolino, but yes, my journey has always been linked from the beginning to the stage. Okay, Mariano gave a very clear and helpful distinction. There's the composition for the stage and there's the composition at Tavolino, which is to say written, the playwright, writing at his little table, okay? So Mariano is fortunate to belong to a company. He has a company at his back that he's in constant interaction with. I mean, it's just, as a note, it's interesting to hear this because this, it really goes back to the roots of Italian theater deriving from the Commedia dell'arte, which was completely almost, the author was a less significant character for the most part, and then going through Galdoni, who was a person who worked like Chekhov with actors and developed roles actually specifically for actors, for specific actors. It's quite beautiful, a mixture, you know, of a new technology and a musician who also writes, like someone said, the great philosopher, if you have a traditional, old, beautiful, cultural heritage like theater and then something new comes up, like virtual reality or film at the time, something new happens. We have something coming out of a school that also values acting and directing, and there's a dialogue or a company, an ensemble where you write for the actors or as Gabriele says, it was also you're involved very closely with it. I think that's why I think this is a, so lively, so contemporary. And I think, yes, it has something to say. Thomas has a question for you. All these plays were not, except one, maybe, were of course not translated in English. We could not afford to translate all 15 of them, all the significant works. What the Italian advisory board said out of the last two years, these are the most significant works. So I want to let everybody know this is a big deal. And Thomas, so you translated the first pages and the synopsis. What did you detect when you saw the text, when you read them? And of course you have to read them so closely. Is there, what surprised you? Well, a few things. One is, I mean, I just about translating in general, it's a little bit like being an actor because you basically become a mouthpiece for the writer. And also it's a little bit similar to acting in the sense that when you work on a play, you completely plunge yourself and immerse yourself into a world, into an imaginative world intensely to the degree that you forget yourself. And then you go on to, and then, you know, an actor does that for a certain period of time. And then that plays done, and they go on to the next thing and they plunge themselves into another reality. So that was a little bit the way working on all this series of plays, one right after the other felt. Some texts you feel a great deal of affinity with and others you feel as though you're kind of an outer space. And you can just hang on to the words and translate the words as best you can and hope it's coming through. One of the things that I'd say about these four plays that maybe has more to do with the reader than the writer is that, you know, in different ways, they were COVID plays. They felt like they were somehow conditioned by even though I think some of the plays were written before, this happened. And yet it's because, you know, the reader is constantly, or the spectator is constantly seeing reality filtered through their own experience. And so in very different ways, I mean, from the use of virtual reality of being kind of detached from actual contact between people to Gabriele's play, which is about a kitchen underground in a slightly where there's this slightly in the future where there's this onslaught of sludge like seeping into the kitchen to the kind of Mariano's play is basically a long monologue of a person who's very much into his own head. And then Tatiana's play is about a couple of people who are like tourists who have this kind of superficial idea of we're going to go out and we're going to have a wild time in this city. And then they find their themselves in the middle of something that's much more than they were really ready to deal with. So each of the plays, even though they were written in a specific moment, has something to say about the moment we're living in now. Yeah, I want our audience also to know when we ask our 12 members, 12 also professionals, people who read plays for very different reasons, whether they are theater historians, actors, directors, producers, playwrights. So it's a whole mixture. We ask them, please look, what is the artistic value of the play? What is the theme of the play? Is it of interest? What is the interest of the seem to New York audience? Something that might well work really great in London or in Turkey or Greece or Asia might not be the right homeopathic pill in New York. And also then originality. Is that something unique? Do you feel something? So all these four, I think, significant points we came up with when we asked our readers to look at it up significant. So these are the four plays that came out and we are really proud of it. And I think we're going to go through them. We're going to ask maybe everyone to tell us a little bit about the play to be heard from the author, from the writer. And the writer, of course, is someone who is in dialogue with a lot of plays that happened before and at the moment. And it's in Italy. It's influenced by so much. But again, these are writers. This is what they do in like a painter paints, as culture makes culture. These are writers who create work for the stage and it's some of the best out of two years in something that we relate to. So these are pearls that built inside the oysters or we could say how I like to say, like diamonds that come under pressure, like tectonic plates, press things together and it gets concentrated. Diamonds are the hardest structure, some of the hardest on planet Earth. Even so, when you put them under heat, they disappear. And if you want to make a great diamond, you have to cut it. You know, a good diamond, you find it. Diamonds are brilliant because more light comes out than comes in. That's why they are shining, they reflect. But in order to have them shine, sometimes you lose two thirds of the weight. So you cut away a lot. So these people who are with us and of course all the others ones who they were, they produced these kind of diamonds. They experienced the pressure. And they also cut a lot to make it shine, to make it fun to make tough choices and to come something else. And this is what they came up with. This is their stories where artists said, I want you to listen to audiences. This is of meaning. This is significant. And it might have a meaning also for your life. It has a meaning for me. And as we see the world through painting, through poetry, writing, we also see the world in art through performance and theater with the hope that we learn something from the experience the writers did, the journey. So we're going to go now through those four plays. And maybe we start with Mimosa. Mimosa, tell us a little bit. What's your work about? Tell us the story. How did you do it? My story is about identity. And this identity, I explored it both in the drama and in the communication. So my play, it's about identity and it's built into the plot. The theme is built into the plot. And it takes place half in presence, that is to say flesh and blood acting between the actors on stage and half through a virtual reality device. Let's say that the matrix of inspiration, Pirandello, as a feeling, as an Italian tradition, and that is similar to what we are used to see and live lately, that is, my matrix, my inspirational matrix is Pirandello, as coming from the Italian tradition and the way he played with the question of what is reality. And the present moment, those issues brought up to the present moment. And especially in terms of the contemporary genres of this serial TV, you know, these long television programs we see with lots of episodes in the genre of the thriller. Yes. So, and especially in terms of the contemporary genres of this serial TV, you know, these long television programs we see with lots of episodes in the genre of the thriller. Yes. So, yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Spanish playwriting than I am of knowledgeable about American playwriting. Especially Irish and English playwrights for me. It's true that we have a strong tradition in Italy that can also be a weight on our shoulders. But we also have a definite strong tradition of interlinking with other European nations. But we also have a definite strong tradition of interlinking with other European nations. There's been European policies of inter-translation between the nations. And this has been very helpful for becoming aware of what's going on in other countries. Now hopefully this kind of interconnection will expand also on the other side of the ocean. Yeah. And Mariano, do you follow international or global playwriting? Well, I don't know how to say, I'm capable at this moment to quote a text from the authors. But I also take advantage when in the theatres there are productions that bring the texts from other European countries and also from other continents and I run to look at them with great interest. Personally, I think that the preciousness of a project like this is in one aspect. I think that, as Gabriele said at the beginning, that something starts to move compared to the entry of contemporary drama in the most institutional theatres. I think that this is true and that it should somehow grow, this possibility. And also the opportunity for contemporary Italian drama to be put on stage. Mariano, one moment. Well, he's just saying I can't really think of, I can't cite a text in particular, but I know when I can, I see all the productions from foreign countries and that come through and I go to them with great interest and enthusiasm. What's precious about an initiative like this is this initiative of, you know, yours, Valeria and Franks is that it connects up with what Gabriele was saying about things are starting to happen. They're starting to be more institutional movement and responsiveness to these kinds of initiatives. Yes, the same is for the opportunity to create for Italian drama abroad. I think that this project or others will have to make this opportunity grow. And a project like this really helps Italians reach out abroad across borders and expand into the world. Yeah, it is incredible also to know that America, a very big country, financially strong country, a billion dollar industry and Broadway. So very little travels outside America doesn't have the Goethe Institutes, the Instituto Italiano. There are very little communications outside and I think they are very interesting contemporary writers, you know, they don't know about your work, you don't know about their work. But musicians listen to world music, it's easier, you know, you can listen to music, I'm sure. And Mimosa listens to musicians from Africa and Asia, America and Europe, it's easier, but it's not here. So Valeria to come to slowly to an end before I ask you guys what you are working on Valeria, what is your hope with the playwrights project? And what do you want to achieve in the ideal version? Why do you put all this work and I know it's in the evening and it's late and you have to do it back and forth and you have to fight for it and next to other projects you work on, you know, why is that so important to you, this Italian play? Why did you do it? The goal of this project is make readable many, many plays as many plays we can. And so as I can read an English or American play, I would like that other people that doesn't understand Italian can read Italian plays. So this is the first simple desire. Then after that, many other desires came off, came on because, you know, we just just made a movie on a play of the Italian playwrights of the last edition of the second edition, the book for Winter by Armando Pirazzi. And we had the possibility to experiment a new vision of theater in cinema. So the dialogue between cinema and theater. And it was very, very interesting to do this experience. It was a new kind of desire. So I work in theater many years now, it's like 34 years. And so now I was very young, I was passionate and I am still passionate and I am not still very young. But when I was very younger, I every, every time say, oh, I am doing these, this is theater, but I love also something different for theater. And maybe in the future, I will have the occasion to prove that something different is possible. It's incredible the time of Corona where I don't this now have apps and that and create artwork artists are interested in science people make films they haven't done it before. The researchers in academia make performances of what they research. Hybrid forms. Also Valeria brought Italian writers will you know and others to Italy so it's a two way street, and we all have to engage in a global dialogue. The problems we are facing like racism, homophobia, the ecological crisis and economic crisis, global crisis. And to see that you know that only can be understood and solved in a in a global context and I think theater has to be a model to look at if theater is interested. Interesting because it is a model. It happens in theater. It can also happen in life because for a moment. It's real and I think this project is a great model to show that different thinking to out to work locally but to think globally to be inspired and understand each other better. I think it is important and I think it's an excellent excellent project. Thomas for you as a last question. You have all your life with place and work of course, often from established writers writers who are classical now you know who are in the pantheon so how did the Italian playwrights for the place of our for where do they fit in what do you think it's unique you know I don't have a, I don't have a solid answer for you it's it's also stimulating. I mean there's just every, every play starts off with a like a big question mark, and it's like what's this going to be. And so for me, you know it was a very rapid experience so working on this but it's just like each one of these plays just opens up a new vision. And we'll, I mean the goal as as Valeria said would be because a play really, from my point of view it doesn't really exist until it's taking place live with an audience. And everything else is basically just talk you know. So, that's what we want that's what we would like this project to be to get the place staged and let it, let it get it out of the hands of get it in the hands of the actors get it in the minds of spectators. Will it have an audience in America you think people will come. Well, it's hard because we talked about insular American audiences are incredibly insular really there's much more it's much there's much more access to international theater and Rome. Then there is in most places in the United States, even in the major cities. Everybody is so self involved in the United States that that. I don't see why not any good production, any good production is going to set off sparks. Yeah, I think so too I think that would be an audience people will be interested. And I hope one day there will be money for a festival of Italian plays or as Valeria says that idea of filming on stage so some kind of fusion form a new invention of, as she said the like chamber plays, camera plays or something. We can do it so as a last question and then we're going to go. Oh, you go to sleep it's past midnight in Italy and I'm sure as a good writer sleep is important so much happens in our sleep we dream and we write our plays actually the day we just catch up with what we dream. Yeah, but what, what are you guys working on and now maybe we go backwards so poor Tatiana doesn't have to work as the first. So what are you guys working at the moment what's your new play and, and is there a novel you read or a piece of music you're listening to is there something inspiring so what's inspiring. And what are you working on right now. Am I the first. Yes. I'm writing a new play, which will be staged by a group of young actors of 10 young actors, and it's about desire. Okay, so, and do you read something did you listen to something something inspiring that came across you for in this time of Corona something that made you wonder. Yes, I'm reading. Yes I'm reading and listening to a lot of stuff but for sure something that is really inspiring inspiring me now is Mark Fisher work. Yes, his work, and I'm listening to a lot of effects twin. And I walk a lot, listening to music through the city. That's a great way of walking in cities and nature is a great idea to connect. Yeah, Gabriele, what about you what are you working on with your fiance and the moment and what's inspiring you at the moment. I'm not, I'm not working on something theatrical, as I said before, I'm collecting things for the theater, but I'm focusing on the science of a film. I have in mind this story of this pulman and this road movie on 14 people who take a pulman from Italy through the Balkans until they arrive in Mejugorje and tell a spiritual journey. Oh, your sound your sound Thomas. I thought I was done. I'm working on a screenplay about a bus trip that 14 people take across Italy to Mejugorje, which is a pilgrimage site. Right. Yeah. In the East, yeah, Eastern Europe. And, and, and Gabriele, what, what is inspiring you? What are you reading, listening to me? Colpice tantissimo lo scontro tra scienza e fede la scienza chiama i miracoli con un nome specifico che si chiama shock charismatic. La scienza dice che quando noi viviamo qualcosa come miracolo in realtà all'interno del nostro corpo si sono alleate una serie di forze biologiche che ci permettono di vivere qualcosa come fosse un miracolo la fede invece lo vive come miracolo. I'm very interested in the clash between science and faith. So scientific phenomena as and the concept of a miracle changes in biological forces from a point of view of faith can be or to sometimes described as charismatic shock. That's the happening. That's a scientific terminology for the happening of a miracle. Amazing. Amazing. Amazing. And I think that's an interesting time to think about Mariana. What about what are you working on next to the play and you're going to go tomorrow but is there something new on the horizon. Allora in questo momento sono in una sorta di fase di rigenerazione scrivo in linea di massima un test ogni due anni e dopo che il testo nuovo debutta per alcuni mesi mi considero come una terra da cui il raccolto è stato tratto a cui bisogna dare un tempo per rigenerarsi per poter creare una nuova cultura. Right now I'm in a phase right now I'd say I'm in a phase of regeneration usually I write one play in two years and I write the play and then get it staged and then afterwards I go into a like from an agricultural point of view a fallow period where all the resources can regenerate and utilize. Malamente su una domanda è fantastica su un personaggio. La domanda è se in che termini è possibile in che tempi in che modo una dramaturgia che restituisca l'esperienza in cui siamo tutti della pandemia. So. Sorry. Sorry. Okay, so I'm meditating on the ways and means that it would be possible to render the moment we're living through right now with of the pandemic and I'm focusing on the character of Cassandra. Good and what are you listening to what are you reading or what's inspiring you. So I'm very I'm very inspired by this American series that I'm following these days called the good place. Great. Yeah, it's a good show it really really is. So mimosa you started and now you have the final words. What are you working on did you now went to a dome projections or and what is the technology are you having new ideas what are you working on. Yes, I'm working on the figure of the women. Sula Donna is Sula conflict. Tra quello che è veramente terreno pornographico e quello che è il santo. It is the corner. The corner. Okay, so the figure of woman and and where. No conflict or the figure of the Donna Santa and the figure, how can I say, the prostitute of pornography. Okay, so the conflict between the holy woman and pornography. See, and let's say I do it in the music. I'm looking for this in a generally completely different that sacred and punk. So I'm looking at from a musical inspiration point of view I'm confident I'm putting sacred music together with punk. Interesting and you is also virtual reality project. Not yet I'm just thinking. Amazing so what do you what inspires you what are you listening to what are you reading or seeing. I'm listening. Max Richter. Max Richter yes. Yes, and about. And the electric guitar. You play electric guitar. Yes. Yes, good so we didn't see your cats they're not showing up for us right. Yeah. So here we go. So I think we are coming closer to an end. Once the most our shoulder cats I guess this will be the, the goodbye image really thank you all for listening our this is important to have good theater to have. Oh, wow, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful black cat. So it's important to have great theater and good theater but we need a good audience. It is all about the audience actually that's why all the writers and art theater artists here produce the work that's been seen and someone makes processes that make sense out of a great meaning perhaps completely different meaning than that was thought, but it is a contribution to understand the complex world we live in the world we live in is complex. And people try to tell us it's black and white is good and evil all is simple it's not true. And if you want to know how the world really is look at playwrights look at Shakespeare look at the work of me most of Marianne Gabriele Tatiana this is a how the world really is how complex it is how difficult it is and we are catching a little piece of reality there even if the reality is imagined and symbolic, but it is something that is true. And this is what artists do they search for the truth as much as people in law or people in the sciences and, and so this is an important contribution to the history mankind to to the civil dialogue we have and to what I think is the foundation of our societies. It is a sharing of the arts and experiencing of the arts access to the arts, and they're making a great invaluable contribution because they are part of the civilized world. And this is an audience member up hot of it to and if you have a great society, you have a great theater, you have great sports, you have exciting music, great painters, you know, so it's a reward for being a good place and there is a good place to work for it and I guess in Italy perhaps but also especially in America now. A lot of words needs to work needs to be done, and the contribution writers do for to bring us together to look at something together in a collective moment to talk about it is invaluable because it goes to the very foundation of what mankind is about artists talk to each other come to solutions, present something on time. And so it's a model for a civic society where conflicts are shown in a symbolic way, and we hopefully understand the world a little bit better or have better questions. I'm terribly sorry we don't have a single evening normally the playwrights fly over or some of them. And I don't know what the next year I doesn't look good in New York. We don't think the theaters will open till the fall, maybe not at all. We just heard the first ones that they will only do online teaching also in the fall. People are afraid of COVID of getting infected the teachers or the students nobody wants to be sued so it's a terrible time still ahead of us and so we all have to use it in a good way. And, and one of it is to, you know, listen better what we did now we listen to our writers here from Italy they really do have something to say to share our lives or sufferings or a joy. And, and I think this is what the Italian playwrights project also now contributes even so we never thought it would be in that context on zoom and in times of COVID. In America more people die of COVID than half they were killed in the World Trade Center bombing 911 is over 3000 it's devastating here at the moment. And everybody is out of work in theater musicians there's no place to go no place to perform theater people often work in bars and restaurants they all close musicians performed in bars and restaurants. It's a great great musician it's all close the biggest concerts in New York City you see is someone is playing on the street and a full farmers market or for a restaurant but even now it's too cold for that so it's a complicated time it's part of history we are and you are part of this because that happens to be in this time thanks again to Valeria also for really putting this together she is the, the guiding angel behind this it's her ideas her projects her work that makes this happens we help her or try to help her but it's only here because of her energy her ideas for dedication. And thanks for Tom and so many others to help us to make us in Patricia I was on the twice report Marco and and so many many others so thank you again and I have to close it down now Valeria. Thank you for being there for us. We have, we have two years to a path of two years so translations, maybe COVID really will go away. Talk about also readings and the connection between the authors and the translators so this is just the start. Thank you all to be here thank you all for your passion to be here and to listen. This is the reason we mean speaking in English, and we ask you just five minutes, Tom, we give them for all the time. Thank you for Tom that was brilliant it's important to translate as directors translate from page on stage and actress translate you know. And then, if you are curious, if you are curious to listen and not listen to read some Italian plays in English, we have three books online, you can, you can check. The Italian Americans playwrights project just Google it you will find it. And again, thank you all very much and have a good night in, in Italy. Thank you. As soon as we all know you shouldn't look at screens an hour or two before you go to sleep so you poor Italian writers this is thus we did damage to your health, but it was worth it like a good party when you have a headache the next day. It was worth it. Thank you all we really, really, really thank you six to howl around again for hosting us for Andy to make this also happen the great see and be J for being so generous to say this is important let's have a national broadcast about this so thank you all and to our listeners again really really thank you for taking the time. Goodbye everybody. Thank you.