SANI!

In this period of suspended theatre, not everything depends on regulations, but rather on good sense, on courage, on trust and on ourselves... conventionally, a theatre ticket sold corresponds to a seat, while I see it corresponding to a right; a right to live an experience from within, rather than seeing it from outside. This is how Marco Paolini introduces SANI!, a performance conceived in 2021, another year characterised by the suspension of artistic activities following the lockdowns that characterised 2020. Based on an autobiographical plot outline that brings together stories both old and new, the project has gradually been enriched with song and music, written by Saba Anglana and Lorenzo Monguzzi; by a part of an album from thirty years ago, a journey from the past that speaks of the present. From the epic-comic meeting and clash between Carmelo Bene and Marco Paolini in 1983 to the meeting-clash between Regan and Gorbachev at the Reykjavik discussions in Höfði, Iceland, in 1986; from the reconstruction following the earthquake of 1976 in Friuli to the recovery following the pandemic. Each subject, every event, is a part, character, scene and thread of a story that takes the form of a ballad, where words and song have equal footing. Sani is an expression used in greeting in the foothills of the Alps, in the Piave Valley: It is a greeting, a blessing, an encouragement. It originates from the word Salus, and sums up the meaning of theatre in these times, a theatre that unites, creating bridges.