Kamikaze – I hope it goes better than last time

◎ ANTEPRIMA ◎
in collaboration with Ra-dici

by and with Giulio Santolini
dramaturg Lorenza Guerrini
sound & light designer live Daniele Boccardi
production La Corte Ospitale
with the support of Ministero della Cultura, Regione Emilia-Romagna
artistic residencies Attodue, Fabbrica Europa/PARC
thanks to CollettivO CineticO, Simone Arganini, Stefano Tumicelli, Fabio Novembrini

“I wish this tragedy a better audience, rougher, more immediately sincere, closer to enjoying and suffering, a popular audience”
Antonio Gramsci l’Avanti November 14, 1920

Since its birth, theater has needed at least two elements to exist: the actor and the spectator. If initially the boundary between the two roles was blurred, a world where collective rituals flowed into representations, where the city gathered and everyone contributed to the enjoyment of the myth, with the passing of years and centuries the distance became increasingly clear. The skills required to perform a score became increasingly complex, a separation was necessary, and the audience began to demand something. The more society refined itself, the more spectators became accustomed to sitting and receiving more silently what the performer had to offer. If in the time of the Dukes of Mantua an unwelcome actor could risk death, if during Molière’s first performances the audience could freely indulge in a pleasant embrace to ward off yawns or even trigger a revolution, today theater and spectators have become more polite, respectful, perhaps less dangerous. What has changed? What is the relationship between a performance and its audience? What would happen today if the audience had the opportunity to express an immediate judgment, to condemn and punish an actor who does not satisfy their taste?
In KAMIKAZE – I hope it goes better than last time – the pact will be sealed from the beginning with a prologue that will immediately break every barrier, providing an instruction manual to access the device. A series of rounds will follow in which Giulio Santolini, with the help of the technician on stage with him, will challenge taste, morality, and boredom by creating short performances that will be immediately judged and evaluated by the audience. Spectators will be called to follow their instinct and give their verdict. At the end of each performance there will be a vote: if the majority of spectators are satisfied, the performer will receive a prize; if they are disappointed, a punishment. Once the performance is over, it will move on to a new round, a new creation, a new verdict, a new prize/punishment, and so on.
How important is the construction of an experience aimed at pleasing the audience? What is the boundary between culture and entertainment? What does it tell us about our society? The practice of art can oppose manipulative representations and offer a model of freedom: a model not governed by claims of correctness, in which disbelief is suspended by deconstructing stereotypes, experiencing subversion and anarchy.
KAMIKAZE – I hope it goes better than last time – is a show that wants to build community by inhabiting without superstructures a small Agora where the experience of gaze and judgment can be valued.
A playful and ruthless device.
A manual of instructions for practicing disorder and triggering a reversal of roles.
A reflection on the relationship between culture and entertainment, between complacency and artistic product.
A game in search of beauty in error.
What does “failure” really mean? What is wrong for some, can be fascinating, surprising, even wonderful for others. What is the meaning of the word success? Who decides what is beautiful, what is art, and what, instead, is just trash?
Can we change our point of view? Can we stop, even for a moment, worrying about what others will think?

ph. Stella Capelli