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Writing a text about what happened to Utoya, Norway, in 2011 is a challenging undertaking. Theater is not the place for documentation and information first and foremost; it is the place for reflection. And reflection on such an event baffles: it is not an act of madness, but at the same time it is. It is not political conspiracy, but simultaneously it is. It is not an example of inefficient defense systems, and yet it is. It is not a case of information concealment, yet it is.
When I was a boy and opened the newspaper I had a grid, perhaps a bit crude but functional, to categorize what was going on. It seemed that all over the world a few simple categories were enough to frame an event, and gave people a chance to find a way to react. But after 1989 the world became a much more complicated place from to interpret, and after 2001 understanding an event is like entering a maze.
What Theater, or rather my playwriting, can do within this labyrinth is to find characters to walk through it and return it to us through the filter of their personalities and relationships. So with Arianna, Mattia, Serena and Luca, companions in this adventure, we chose to go back there, to Norway, that terrible July 22, 2011, to observing three couples involved in different ways in what was happening. Through them I opened wide a window of reflection, which if not from all the way out from that labyrinth, at least to flashes, illuminates some of its dark areas with the light of poetry.
Edward Grass
It all started with a book, "Silence on the Innocents" by Luca Mariani, a journalist who does not give up on first answers, who insists.
It is July 22, 2011, in Norway. Anders Behring Breivik, "the monster," unleashes hell. Eight dead with a car bomb to Oslo, a diversion and then the real target: 69 labor youths killed one to one on the island of Utøya, the 'Nordic paradise,' the historic site of summer camps for socialist youths around the world.
I had repressed those events. How could I have forgotten such a serious and recent massacre that took place in the heart of a peaceful and united Europe? Why had I forgotten? The answer was not long in coming.
The narrative returned by the media was distorted, biased and arbitrary: one of the many tragedies caused from by armed "madmen," such as those that happen often in America. In short, the kind of facts for which you shake your head and move on until to you forget.
Nothing could be more wrong. I was discovering that the massacre had been planned for years, with lucidity and conscientiousness bordering on the maniacal, and that it was not against an to accidental target but against the heart of the young "promises" of European socialism. It was a political massacre.
When I finished the book, I felt strongly the desire that probably animated the author himself: we need to talk about these things, reflect on them, make them resonate in our lives that do not write History but live it.
Utoya is an attempt to do memory and denunciation without doing "civil theater," it is to full-fledged contemporary tragedy.
Looking at it is like looking at to Medea, to Oedipus, to Bacchae, with the only difference being that what is narrated here really happened.
And, perhaps, it could still happen if we do not pay attention to who we are, to what society we are contributing to to build, to the world we want to leave in the hands of our children.
Serena Sinigaglia
esto **Edoardo Erba **
with advice from Luca Mariani, author of The Silence on the Innocents
directed **Serena Sinigaglia **
Maria Spazzi scenes
lights Roberto Innocenti
with Arianna Scommegna and Mattia Fabris
production **Teatro Metastasio Stabile di Prato **
In collaboration with **Theater Ringhiera ATIR**.
Under the patronage of the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Italy
He was born to Pavia and lives to Rome. He is considered one of the greatest living Italian authors. Marathon of New York is his best-known title along with to Muratori and Margherita and the Rooster. _Marathon _has been translated into seventeen languages and performed all over the world. Muratori is a cult hit in its fourteenth season. Margarita and the Rooster has been presented in major Italian theaters. The other comedies from report are: Italia anni dieci directed by Sinigaglia, _Nove _directed by Avogadro, _Vera Vuz _and Dramma italiano directed from Lorenzo Loris, _Tante Belle Cose _staged from D'Alatri, Senza Hitler from Pugliese, Animali nella nebbia from Magelli, Vizio di famiglia from Solari. Also: Sellers, Michelina, Trout, On the Train with Albert, North Wall, Good News, The Man of My Life, Smallpox, Blind Curve, Human Fabrics, Wild Pig, Picasso's Night and Radical Obstructionism. Abroad-beyond to Marathon-Picasso's Night was presented to Hollywood and Rio de Janeiero. Family Vice to London and Buenos Aires, _Dejavu _in London and Hamburg, Muratori to Frankfurt Oder and Warsaw, _Venditori _in Wilhelmshaven, Barcelona, Amsterdam and Budapest, Animals in the Fog to St. Petersburg. Adaptations for the stage include: Bennet's Naked and Uncooked, Diderot's The Nephew of Rameau, Ibsen's Enemy of the People, Die Panne on Durrenmatt, Yeoshua's May Night, Billy Wilder's Front Page and The Apartment, Appearances Deceive, Festen, When the Wife is on Vacation. Erba has translated the entire theatrical repertoire of Agatha Christie published from Mondadori. He is published in Italy from Ubulibri and Titivillus.
Born to Milan, in 1996 she graduated in directing from the Civica Scuola di Arte Drammatica "Paolo Grassi" and founded to.T.I.R. (Independent Theatre Association for Research), of which she is also artistic director. Since 2008, he has been artistic director of Teatro Ringhiera in Milan. She teaches directing at Naba, New Academy of Fine Arts Milan, and acting at the Piccolo Teatro School in Milan. She has dedicated herself to rereadings of classics, to starting with Romeo and Juliet, through Euripides' Bacchae and Trojan Women to Aristophanes' Women in the Parliament, and then to identifying and addressing many emerging voices in European dramaturgy. He has directed and directed operas including Tosca for the Teatro La fenicie in Venice and Carmen for the Sferisterio in Macerata, Il Giasone for the Opèra in Geneva. He published a novel for Rizzoli And Everything Was Different. In two decades he has established deep relationships and important collaborations with leading Italian theaters and the best artists on the contemporary theater scene. His directing credits include productions by the Teatro Stabile di Torino(6Bianca by Stephen Amidon, 2015) and the Piccolo Teatro di Milano(La bellezza e l'inferno by and with Roberto Saviano, 2009; La bug di V. Majakovskij, with P. Rossi and M. De Francovich, 2008; or Il grigio by G. Gaber, with F. Russo Alesi, 2003). Recent works include Nudi e crudi by Alan Bennet with Maria Amelia Monti and Paolo Calabresi, production Artisti Associati and Utoya by E. Erba with Arianna Scommegna and Mattia Fabris, production Teatro Metastasio di Prato. Numerous awards including the recent Hystrio award for directing (2015), ANCT award for career to date (2014), Ambrogio d'oro at Teatro Ringhiera (2012).
Born to Milan, she graduated in scenography in 1995 from the Academy of Fine Arts of Brera. Since 1996 she has been working as a set designer signing the staging of prose shows for several theatrical realities among which the Piccolo Teatro di Milano in 2015, 2012, 2009, 2007, the Teatro Stabile di Torino in 2015 and 2002, of Friuli Venezia Giulia in 2016 and 2011, of Tuscany in 2015 and Sardinia in 2010; for opera he works with La Fenice in Venice (2014), Macerata Opera Festival (2012), Rossini Opera Festival (2003), Landestheater Salzburg (2008, 2006), Teatro Lirico Petruzzelli (2004), Circuito Lirico Lombardo (2004, 2005), Aslico (1996 to 2014). Since 2008, he has been leading seminars in scenography at SUPSI in Lugano. In 1996 he participates in the founding of the ATIR theater company, which produces and distributes prose shows under the direction of Serena Sinigaglia, for which he signs the scenography, in the major Italian and foreign theaters, and since 2007 has managed the Teatro Ringhiera in Milan. Alongside the close artistic collaboration with Sinigaglia that began in 1996, he also collaborates with artists such as G. Dall'Aglio and G. Vacis. He is creative director for the image of Teatro Ringhiera for which he creates and promotes the participatory art project La Piana (2015). He designs the staging of theater festivals such as IT festival (2015) and Granara Festival (2000) and participates in the founding of VDC allestimenti (2010). She also works as a designer (Milan Furniture Fair 2013) and creator of site-specific art installations (Castel del Monte 2005).