The Servant of Italy
A production Fellowship of Eridani associazioneTeatrale
Directed
Catherine Fazio
Playwrights to
Giulia Pelone
With
C: Andrea Scaglioni
Servo: Cristiano Boni
live music
Valentina Sardella, clarinet and saxophone
A comedy for a living and two servants, the weaver of our history (years 1856-1859) and his butler. A comedy inspired by actual events: the unification of Italy, maybe a great game entrusted to the hands of a select few, a matter living room, with an interval at the spa. A continuous diplomatic balance and equilibrium, an international game of many small pieces moved by forces larger than themselves.
Building on some initial episodes of the unified process, we propose here a short piece for two actors, trapped in a stylish lounge, which over time take on the one looks like a statue, the other - the servant - the robes of the true owner of the place and time. And time goes on stage marked by a clarinet.
The Servant of Italy sheds light on the shadowy side of a story that belongs to us, allowing himself the freedom to play and establishing new openings in it, imagining the little secret history of each life.
Caterina Di Fazio, Francesca Di Fazio, Julia Pelone
The Servant of Italy
History
The Servant of Italy aims to address part of the unitary process of our country, putting the figure as the nerve center of Cavour as the main weaver unification of Italy.
This decision follows on the heels of the official history, starting from the four nodal points of the diplomatic efforts of the Count: the Crimean War, the next Paris Congress, the pacts Plombières and diplomatic capability to force Austria to war.
These facts emerge against the backdrop of a story that is intended to summarize, integrate, and sometimes contradict, with the daily life of Cavour.
The entire story takes place in one place: the living room of an imaginary "home Cavour" inhabited by only two characters: Cavour and his servant, and a presence in the background, Time - suonatrice clarinet.
The beginning of the show sees the return of Cavour Paris Congress, convened in 1856 to restore peace after the Crimean War, fought victoriously from the Ottoman Empire, France, Britain and the Kingdom of Sardinia against Russia. Cavour seems very disappointed because everything was done in the worst way. He managed to get a supplementary section to discuss the Italian situation, the last period marked by the Republican insurgent threat, but without coming to any practical conclusion. In addition, the low number of soldiers killed in the only successful battle does not allow him to advance any territorial claim. His hopes among other things had already been disappointed by the course of the battle: he had Piedmont also involved in the Crimea because imagined a descent into the field of Austria to Russia's side, another great Catholic power, but it did not happen.
It then continues with a scene that sums up the playful dense weaves Cavour diplomatic intrigue behind the Emperor Napoleon III, to persuade him to support the Kingdom of Sardinia in the war against Austria. He uses a variety of characters (the Countess of Castiglione, Costantino Nigra, Italian Ambassador in Paris, Felice Orsini, Francesco Arese) to pressure Napoleon III, relying on friendship, respect, desire, fear of another attack on his person.
Much work seems to lead eventually to bear fruit, at the secret meeting that takes place between Napoleon III and Cavour in the spa town of Plombières. Here are the two strategists in the act of traveling from the top down the Italian peninsula, because any intent to seek a cause for an attack in Austria since the war should be defensive in nature and not offensive. Then the two men was to imagine a table the division of the Italian peninsula, outlining a project but in the end will not be fully realized.
The next scene sums up the various events held between February and April 1859. It opens with Cavour returned from Paris where he tried in every way to persuade Napoleon III to declare war on Austria, that war looks increasingly unlikely. In February 1859 the Minister of Foreign Affairs French Walewski, supported by the Catholic community, which also belongs to the Empress Eugenie, is opposed to war as the British foreign minister, Malmesbury. Napoleon himself is undecided. Meanwhile, the situation becomes untenable Cavour of Piedmont and Italian public opinion, which had relied on Cavour to force Austria to war. In this scenario, 18 March, is part of the Russian proposal for a congress of the five major powers on the Italian question. Vittorio Emanuele, now convinced of the failure of the Cavour, attacks him, accusing him of having forced him to use his Clotilde old daughter as a bargaining chip to obtain membership Napoleon's war against Austria. Cavour then runs in Paris and Napoleon III of threat and seek refuge in America to publish his version of events, with documents in his possession. Writing to the emperor, Cavour said that "we are lost without return," the king was forced to abdicate, the ministers, starting with him, would become the object of public execration, which fell upon him the responsibility "of disasters that threaten my king and my country. "
These facts lead Cavour to opt for suicide. On April 19, 1859 we find him intent on dictating to his faithful servant, will direct a letter to his nephew Ainardi. So the count is close study of his apartment and begins to destroy documents and papers.
Everything seems to turn for the worse, until the final coup de théâtre, April 23, 1859, Austria issued an ultimatum to the Kingdom of Sardinia.
The show ends with this question: because an outbreak of the Second War of Independence? Austria is facing a severe financial crisis and the uprising in Hungary. The disbursement of a substantial figure for a military campaign and opening a second front in the war can not be of any interest. Can not get territories, since it is unthinkable that France accept the disappearance of the buffer state represented by the Piedmont, and can not hope for monetary compensation due to the precarious state of finances in Piedmont. Because a power of first magnitude such as Austria has compromised his already precarious balance embroiled in a war with a small country, which has nothing to gain?
The answer is probably lost forever in the fire of the fireplace in his house Cavour.
Giulia Pelone
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