“The Stranger, the novel of a crime, of a trial, of an execution, and at the same time of the disagreement between existential despair and freedom, remains and will remain one of the greatest narrative testimonies of our time, a great emblem of the human condition.” So says the back cover of the first Italian edition of Camus’ The Stranger, prophesizing (or predicting) the fortune and reach of a novel that gave voice to what can be called not just a philosophy, but a way of life.
Mr. Meursault, protagonist and guilty stranger, an example of meaningless living recounts a time at least apparently very similar to our own. After all, Camus himself wrote, “Thought is always forward. It sees too far, farther than the body that is in the present.” From these words comes the need for a total rewriting. A text that retraces the novel by questioning not only the story told but also why, even today, this story, this book, can tell us anything. A man, “someone,” on stage, traverses the pages of the book as if they were pages from his own life: who is the Arab that Meursault kills for us? Why should we care about his death? And why, at the same time, should we care about an ordinary man who cannot give a reason for the crime he committed nor mourn a dead mother? What possible outcome could this story have? And what resonances are there with our own?
A monologue addressed to the audience, a narrative that becomes a question, an invective that becomes a lament. In search of any reason that can make sense of our banality, our brutality, our humanity.
inspired by Albert Camus
by Francesca Garolla direction Renzo Martinelli with Woody Neri lights Mattia De Pace
production Teatro i with the support of Next Laboratorio delle Idee
duration 75 min
Renzo Martinelli and Federica Fracassi founded the independent company Teatro Aperto in 1995. After years of nomadic work, they landed at Gaudenzio Ferrari’s headquarters where, together with Francesca Garolla, they inaugurated the Teatro i production and hospitality project in 2004, giving rise to a new cultural path that over the years has won excellent local and national recognition, including numerous Ubu Awards.