How does one teach or perform the Commedia dell’Arte for a contemporary Australian society, yet remain truthful and respectful to the art form?

Presented by Corinna Di NiroHigher Degree by Research ForumDivision of Education, Arts and Social Sciences

Antonio Fava (2004), a contemporary artist and director of the

Commedia dell’Arte who remains faithful to the art form’s historical roots.

Kenneth Richards and Laura Richards (1990) for the historical documents and timeline of the Commedia dell’Arte and how it was greatly impacted by time, culture, politics and economics.

Raymond Williams (2005) ~ theory of popular culture. Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1962) ~ theory of embodiment. Robert Henke (2002) ~ theory of gesture as a form of rhetoric. Hans-Gadamer (1994) ~ theory of interpretation. Methodology / Methods: Practice-led research,

Autoethnographic & Qualitative (interviews, observations)

Theorists / Methodology / Methods

Antonio Fava

Reggio Emilia, Italy.

‘Commedia dell’Arte is a powerful training method, not to be neglected by any stage artist’ (Fava 2004, p.13).

The perception of Commedia in

Australia‘It relies on a convention where stock characters – easily recognised by the audience – appear in one

reincarnation or another in every story. As such, it is highly stylised, intended to be both funny and

didactic all at once and, for most of my experience of it, incredibly predictable and decidedly unfunny, even when it ventures down the innuendo or bawdy

paths’ (Flynn, Adelaide Theatre Guide 2012).

Commedia = Theatre Arte = Trade Commedia dell’Arte = Professional Actor (Now loosely translated to ‘the art of comedy’)

From its birth in the early 16th century to its survival here in the 21st century, the Commedia dell’Arte has traversed across time and culture, forced to reinvent itself to suit the various theatrical fashions over the centuries resulting in a dissipation from source.

Ballet, Opera, Melodrama, Physical Theatre, Slapstick Comedy, the Comic Duo, Improvisation, Harlequinade, Pierrot shows, Punch and Judy and Pantomime.

Developed the archetypes from basic human necessities.

What is the Commedia dell’Arte?

Archetypes ~ Classic

Old Man

Captain

Lovers

Servants

Archetypes ~ Popular

The Mistress

Archetypes ~ Aussie

Process‘Just do it!’ (Nike)

Practice-led Research

TITLE

CHARACTERS BILINGUAL COSTUME

SETS, PROPS, MASK & NON-MASK STORY LINE ~ CIRCULAR & LINEAR

LOCAL NEWS

The Marriage of Flavio & Isabella ~ Classic elements

‘The first rests in the chance to have at least one character use the language of the audience, or the language closest to that of the audience, thus assuring their understanding of the story. The second rests in the verbal gestuality of the ‘dialect’, languages that need to employ the whole body in order to be best pronounced, accented and interpreted’ (Fava 2004, p. 146).

Bilingual

‘At all costs, the actors should avoid the deranged style and silly pretension

of rolling their eyes and flapping their arms about. Instead, gesture should

serve as an escort, which holds up speech, not a clumsy servant who trips over it’ (Henke 2002, p. 203).

In 1697 Paris, the Italian players were evicted from their theatre and

banished for making fun of the king’s mistress and told not to return until 1716, after the death of Louis XIV

(Richards and Richards 1990, p. 262).

Local news

OVERCOMING CAST SIZE WITH COMMEDIA

GABRIELLIANA

FINDING A CONTEMPORARY CATALYST

AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION

TECHNOLOGY

BACKDROP

The Marriage of Flavio & Isabella ~ Modern elements

Overcoming cast size with Commedia Gabrielliana

Self-confidence

Public speaking Quick thinking

Group work Role-playing

Improvisation Devising techniques

Working with non-scripted art forms

Learning Commedia dell’Arte also gives students an opportunity to learn about an art form from a different culture and time, and draw parallels between the art form and their

own lives.

Benefits of Commedia dell’Arte

in Schools

Sourcing Resources

Google = 3 million

websites

YouTube = 4000 clips

5400 texts

3 DVDs

50 educational packs worldwide

I’m time poor and under resourced!

‘Commedia dell’Arte exists in terms of

continuity with respect to tradition and to the past. Continuity is expressed today in

two ways: reconstructive and continuist. To reconstruct means to remake only that one

thing, the way it used to be. To continue means to proceed according to the

principles but with full liberty of invention and elaboration’ (Fava 2004, p.64).

‘The Marriage of Flavio & Isabella’ is my contribution to the

continuality of the Commedia dell’Arte in both practice and

pedagogy.

Conclusion

Department of Education and Children’s Services 2009, South Australian Curriculum standard and Accountability Framework, South Australia, viewed 21 May 2012, <http://www.sacsa.sa.edu.au/index_fsrc.asp?t=HOME>.

Ducahartre P 1966, Italian Comedy, Dover Publications, New York United States of America. Fava, A 2004, The Comic Mask in the Commedia dell'Arte: actor training, improvisation, and the poetics of survival,

ArscomicA, Reggio Emilia, Italy. Flynn, R 2012, Re-Wed, The Marriage of Flavio and Isabella, (review) Adelaide Theatre Guide, South Australia. Gadamer H 1994, Truth and Method, Continuum Publishing Company, New York, United States of America. Gangi, J 1998, ‘Making Sense of Drama in an Electronic Age’ in On the Subject of Drama, pp. 151-168, Routledge, London,

United Kingdom. Grantham, B 2000, Playing Commedia: a training guide, Nick Hern Books, London, United Kingdom.  Haseman, B 2006, ‘A Manifesto for Performative Research’ in Media International Australia incorporating Culture and Policy,

theme issue "Practice-led Research" (no. 118): pp. 98-106, Queensland University of Technology.  Haseman, B 2007, ‘Rupture and Recognition: identifying the performative research paradigm’ in Barrett, E & Bolt, B (eds),

Practice as Research: approaches to creative arts enquiry, I.B Tauris, London.  Henke, R 2002, Performance and Literature in the Commedia dell’Arte, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United

Kingdom.  Leavy, P 2009, Method Meets Art: arts-based research practice, Guilford Press, New York, United States of America.  Merleau-Ponty, M 1962, Phenomenology of Perception, Routledge, London, United Kingdom.  Richards, K & Richards, L 1990, The Commedia dell’Arte: a documentary history, Basil Blackwell for the Shakespeare Head

Press, Oxford, United Kingdom. Rudlin, J 1994, Commedia dell’Arte: an actor’s handbook, Routledge, London, United Kingdom.  Rudlin, J & Crick, O 2001, Commedia dell’Arte: a handbook for troupes, Routledge, New York, United States of America.  Schmitt, N 2004, ‘Commedia dell’Arte: characters, scenarios, and rhetoric’ in Text and Performance Quarterly, vol. 24, no. 1,

pp. 55-73.   Smith, H & Dean, R 2009, Practice-led Research, Research-led Practice in the Creative Arts, Edinburgh University Press,

Edinburgh, Scotland.  Smith, S 1955, The Theatre Arts and the Teaching of Second Languages, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Reading,

Massachusetts. Williams, R 2003, ‘Drama in a Dramatized Society’, in P Auslander (ed), Critical Concepts in Literary and Cultural Studies vol.

II, Routledge, New York, pp. 303-312.

References