Many festivals and open-air events: this is Italy's summer theatre

It is the Italy of summer theater, which in the post-pandemic period finds itself on stage in a flourishing and multiplication of festivals and open-air occasions. Here are the ones not to be missed next weekend

POMPEII - Fifteen evenings of theatre in one of the most famous and visited archaeological sites in the world. It is the return of Pompeii Theatrum Mundi (24 June - 25 July), the fourth edition of the summer event at the Teatro Grande of Pompeii. In total, five shows in one month starting, tomorrow, June 24, with the world premiere debut of Sonia Bergamasco in “Resurrexit Cassandra” by Ruggero Cappuccio, directed by Jan Fabre. For the Flemish director, after the first staging in German in 2020 with Stella Hoettler, this is the second stage of the personal project dedicated to the myth of the unheard priestess, daughter of the king of Troy. With a prologue entrusted to the voice of Cappuccio himself, this only in Italian version mixes spoken parts, images, films, objects, with Cassandra who returns once again to earthly life to help humanity (from June 24 to 26).

NAPLES – Gli affetti, il compagno, le aspirazioni, i sogni infranti e quelli mai sfumati: vitale e generosa, una donna racconta a un commissario la storia della propria vita. Una vita spezzata da un uomo, come capita ogni giorno nell’indifferenza generale. Si apre con il debutto di “Sposerò Biagio Antonacci”, monologo di e con Milena Mancini, per la regia di Vinicio Marchioni (26-27 giugno), il nuovo weekend del Campania Teatro Festival, che in cartellone conta anche Davide Sacco con Gialuca Giacobbi e il “Sesto potere”, quello che scivola tra gli smartphone, nelle notifiche Facebook e nelle stories su Instagram (26 giugno); e Gaetano Liguori con l’omaggio a Don Peppe Diana, stroncato dalla camorra il 19 marzo 1994 nella chiesa di San Nicola a Casa di Principe con “Peppe Diana. il coraggio di avere paura” (28-29 giugno).

SPOLETO (PG) – Amidst so much music, theater, dance, and meetings, the curtain rises on the 64th Festival of the Two Worlds, the first under the artistic direction of Monique Veaute (June 25 – July 11). The program features 60 shows and 500 artists from all over the world, starting on Friday with the Concert in Piazza Duomo and Iva'n Fischer conducting the Budapest Festival Orchestra. Among the first theater events (which will be more prominent in the second part of the festival), Saturday features “La signorina Giulia” directed by Leonardo Lidi from Strindberg, with Giuliana Vigogna, Christian La Rosa, and Ilaria Falini as protagonists (July 26-27).

FERRARA – Of the long idleness of ignorant men, of the lies of lovers, of fame mistaken for glory. The theater outside the theater, the summer season of the Comunale, arrives in Piazza Castello with the verses of Ariosto and the journey of “Astolfo on the moon, in search of Orlando’s wisdom” read by Roberto Pazzi and Moni Ovadia, tomorrow, from the Torre del Castello (June 24).

PONTEDERA (PI) – Angelo has a wife, Renata. Today, perhaps too late, he must give her back a serenity that he has always taken away, forced to live a life that he did not choose, made of compromises and violence. But there always comes a time when you have to prove that the days spent have served a purpose, to be ready, to know how to choose. It is Luca Zinagretti, protagonist of “Angelo”, to inaugurate the third edition of FestiValdera (June 27 – July 12), a festival, this year entitled Poco più che persone, which represents a unicum in the Italian panorama: it is a festival of production and dramaturgy. All the shows on the program are original productions of the Fondazione Teatro della Toscana with dramaturgy by Michele Santeramo, music by Marco Zurzolo, and are all represented in absolute premiere with the direction of Marco D'Amore. Next protagonists, Fabrizio Gifuni, Vittoria Puccini, Marco D'Amore, Toni Servillo. On June 27.

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ROME – Thirty multi-ethnic, fluid, participatory and female-led events. All strictly vacuum-packed. This is how the new edition of “Dominio Pubblico – La Città agli Under 25” (June 25 to July 4) presents itself. Once again, the festival directed by Tiziano Panici “delivers” the city to the new artistic talents, who for two weekends will inhabit the spaces of the Teatro India and the Spazio Rossellini. A journey that follows a multi-ethnic and intercultural line-up with many young artists as protagonists, including Margherita Vicario with the Orchestra Multietnica di Arezzo, Claire Audrin, Ellynora. Also on the program are “Match, a meeting/show between theatrical generations in comparison”. Young artists and companies will clash with well-known artists: Claudia Marsicano, Ubu 2017 Under 35 award winner, against actress Francesca Benedetti; Nicola Borghesi, director and manager of Kepler 452, against Gabriele Lavia.