Monday,
November 26, 2007
"The Glorious Ones" Glorifies
'Commedia Dell'arte': at
The
ANNOTICO Report
Abbott
& Costello
did. So did Cyrano.
Montgomery Burns, Homer
Simpson's boss on "The Simpsons,"
does it to this day
They all borrowed
character traits developed in a 16th-century style of Italian theater known as "commedia dell'arte,
" which is now on display, to a degree, in "The Glorious Ones"
at Lincoln Center's Mitzi Newhouse Theater, the Off-Broadway musical, by
Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens ("Ragtime," "Seussical"), is loosely based on the life of Flaminio Scala,
an early practitioner of the form.
Commedia dell'arte (Italian: "play of professional
artists") was a popular form of improvisational theatre that began in
The performances
were around a repertory of stock, conventional situations: adultery, jealousy,
old age, love, some of which can be traced in the Roman comedies of Plautus and
Terence A>, These characters included the ancestors of the
modern clown. The dialogue and action could easily be made topical and
adjusted to satirize local scandals, current events, or regional tastes, mixed
with ancient jokes and punchlines.
The classic,
traditional plot is that the innamorati are in love
and wish to be married, but one vecchio (elder) or
several elders, vecchi, are preventing this
from happening, and so they must ask one or more zanni (eccentric servant)
for help. Typically it ends happily with the marriage of the innamorati and
forgiveness all around for any wrongdoings. There are countless variations on
this story, as well as many that diverge completely from the structure, such as
a well-known story about Arlecchino becoming mysteriously
pregnant, or the Punch and Judy scenario.
Characters were
identified by costume, masks, and even props, such as the slapstick. Previously
rehearsed Lazzi and Concetti are other tools used by a
commedia troupe. The article below focus on the masks,
and their characteristics.
Student of Commedia Dell'arte
Sunday,
November 25, 2007
|
Abbott
& Costello did.
So did Cyrano.
Montgomery Burns, Homer Simpson's boss on "The Simpsons,"
does it to this day.
They all borrowed
character traits developed in a 16th-century style of Italian theater known as
"commedia dell'arte," which is now
on display, to a degree, in "The Glorious Ones" at Lincoln Center's
Mitzi Newhouse Theater.
The Off-Broadway
musical, by Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens ("Ragtime," "Seussical"), is loosely based on the life of Flaminio Scala, an early
practitioner of the form, and plays through Jan. 6.
Mace Perlman, of
Perlman,...also studied under master mime Marcel Marceau...
It's commedia and its
rich characters that inspire him most.
"These are
stock characters, but they appear in the American musical, in Dickens, in
opera," Perlman says. "They're definitely larger than life.
"I think
life is large and our entertainment today tends to make life small. Real life
is larger than life. We all meet outrageous people all the time."
Perlman has a
trunk full of custom-made leather masks crafted in
All have a
tradition in theater that stretches back to 1500s
"What's
interesting to me is that these characters often get short-changed
nowadays," Perlman says. "People say they're comic stereotypes,
they're one-dimensional characters.
"But what
fascinates me about these characters is that they're really human, no less
so than Shakespeare's characters, or 'Seinfeld' characters or even 'The Simpsons' or Bugs Bunny. When they are treated with
sensitivity and artistry, they are enormously human."
For example,
Perlman says, the character Pantalone gets
the reputation of being a cuckolded foolish old miser while Arlecchino
("Harlequin" in English) gets the reputation of being a stupid,
gluttonous, lazy servant.
"The reality
is actually more interesting. Pantalone is a
capitalist and he's amassed a great deal of wealth and that wealth isolates him
and makes him frightened of being taken advantage of.
"Arlecchino is a servant and will never be a master. He may
dress up as a master, but he's a servant. Pantalone
is a master and is somehow born into that.
"He's a
merchant. Actually, he's middle class. After the commedia, there
develops a merchant character. Venture capitalism starts in
The Captain is
another unique character.
"He's called
the captain and he's a wannabe lover," Perlman says. "He's a military
man, but it's not clear if he's a first-into-battle-and-first-in-retreat sort
of guy. But there's a sense of vanity. The captain often has a vain quality."
In these characters,
audiences saw all the vices.
"Arlecchino is lazy, Pantalone is
a miser, the Captain is vain, full of himself," Perlman says.
"We tend to stop there and dismiss them. But there are many sides to the
captain."
The Dottore, or doctor, is the geek, full of all
kinds of jargon, Perlman says.
"He speaks
868 languages, but he's foolish, too, because nobody can understand what he's
saying. He likes to show off his specialized learning. Does it mean that he's
wise? Probably not."
There is also a
class struggle going on on the commedia stage. The zanni, lower class, are always conniving to get the better
of the vecchi, the upper class.
Arlecchino and Brighella, the servants, are the
forebears of Abbott & Costello.
"The buddy
movies are based on this: Brighella is the servant
with the upper hand, the Bud Abbott. Arlecchino is
Costello, the little brother," Perlman says.
"Gomer Pyle is the Arlecchino and
Sgt. Carter is Brighella."
The captain has
his place in popular culture, too: Col. Klink from "Hogan's Heroes"
is the captain, Perlman says. So, too, is Cyrano, being played on Broadway this
season by Perlman's cousin, Kevin Kline.
"Cyrano is a
fascinating outsider in a way, another captain character."
The richness of
the characters was borne out in remarkable scenarios, or stories.
"The
stories are surprising. They're not predictable," Perlman says.
"Otherwise, why would
After seeing
"The Glorious Ones," which stars Marc Kudisch,
at
For six years,
Perlman studied under Strehler, "the Laurence
Olivier of
"He was like
a god in
More than a dozen
years later, the student is still learning.
"I hate the
idea of reproducing something," he says. "It's not about that at all.
In my education, I was able to begin to become familiar with material that is
so vibrant, so powerful that every time I go back to the original, I get more.
It's a little like Shakespeare."
Like Shakespeare,
commedia had its Promethean promoters,
its Edwin Booths.
"Francesco
Andreini played Captain Spavento, who was enormously
imaginative, larger than life," Perlman says. "He was like
"He was in a
tradition of blowhard soldiers - Milos Gloriosus from Roman comedy - but what Francesco added to
that was a brilliant ability to make metaphor, a dreamer."
Seeing "The Glorious Ones"
makes Perlman burn to share what he knows with students. He has taught at
http://www.nyjournalnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071125/ENTERTAINMENT/711250311
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