KRISTO. tableaux of doubtful wisdom

by Roberto Zappalà

7th step of the Transiti Humanitatis project

direction and body language Roberto Zappalà

texts edited by Nello Calabrò

music various authors | original music and sound carpet l’écume des jours

interpreter and collaboration (double cast) Salvatore Romania / Massimo Trombetta

with the participation of Rebecca Bendinelli, Giulia Berretta, Sofia Bordieri, Andrea Rachele Bruno, Oriana Catania, Laura Finocchiaro, Paola Fontana, Simona Puglisi, Anaelle Spampinato, Paola Tosto, Alessandra Verona

set, light and costumes Roberto Zappalà | technical direction Sammy Torrisi |sound engeneer Gaetano Leonardi | set elements Luigi Pattavina

a coproduction by Scenario Pubblico CZD – Centre of Major National Interest and Teatro Stabile of Catania| in collaboration with MilanOltre Festival

with the support of MIC Ministero della Cultura and Regione Siciliana Ass.to del Turismo, dello Sport e dello Spettacolo

A man who is also Christ, Christ who is also a man, a man who thinks he is Christ, a schizophrenic Christ who thinks he is a man, a man who pretends to be Christ, a poor villager or, as the Italians would say, “a poor christ.”

All plausible, legitimate, connected, and inextricable sides of a “shape” that the performer layers on the stage like an ancient palimpsest; with his body and his voice, in his body and in his voice.

A man/christ gifted with self-irony and doubts, somewhat forgetful and even vain. He is aware that he has a body and perhaps even suffers from multiple personality disorder.

More than dancing, the body moves in an actual choreographic score, roaming in a house/flat/gym scene through scenic tableaux that seamlessly follow one another.

A body that uses and even destroys objects such as chairs, toilets and more; these objects’ everyday use gets transformed, much like the bicycle used in the same way as in Jarry’s passion seen as an uphill bicycle race.

A thoughtful, reflective, and penitent man/christ, almost akin to Saint Jerome.

Tableaux of dubious wisdom, in the ironic double meaning of wisdom that comes from doubt and the doubt that this is wisdom.

Christ is not the unique being who represented a turning point in the history of humankind, but is transformed into a multitude, hence the words of Hampâté Bâ in the Bambara language of Mali “Maa ka Maaya ka ca a yere kono”: the persons of the person are multiple in the person.

Roberto Zappalà’s new creation does not mention the greatest story ever told from the movie by George Stevens, nor is it intended to add any, however small, side note to the deafening audio/video noise that more than two thousand years have produced on the subject.

Visions of images and sounds are proposed, setting the imagination free.

Images and sounds accompanied by words which, in line with the premise of a manifold Christ, are not those spoken by him, whether true or presumed; they are the words of many.

An assemblage of words from the most diverse authors that converge in the voice and body of this ‘new’ Christ.

Words that both question and baffle, creating short-circuits in language, either agreeable or not, that cannot be exploited and prostituted for any purpose, as it has been done too often and continues to be done with the words of Christ.

An assembly (and disassembly) of thoughts, quotes, phrases, aphorisms, verses, interviews.

Words by: Kurt Vonnegut, Charles Simic, Wislawa Szymborska, Stanislaw Jerzy Lec, Michel Tournier, Quino, Gianfranco Ravasi, Olga Tokarczuk, Ryszard Kapuscinski, Richard Feynman, Amadou Hampâté Bâ, Leonardo Sciascia, Daniel Maeguerat, Paolo Poli, Stephen Hawking, Jimmie Durhan, Blake Edwards, Ron Padgett, Wystan Hugh Auden, Mario Savio, Milan Kundera, Fernand Deligny.

Edited by (and with links to) Nello Calabrò