by Eduardo de Filippo
Translation: Angela Ioan

Artistic direction and scenography: Mihai Lungeanu
Premiere date: September 22, 1994

„"The "Art of Comedy" is constituted in a dramaturgical, apologetic essay, in a discourse for home through which art, giving up its fictional props and donning the untransfigured garment of reality, tries to emerge from behind the curtain of indifference to occupy its central place in the sphere of human concerns. This is not an easy thing to achieve because, yesterday as today, those who direct power are in a bad relationship with the idea, with transcendence. (…)

The first half of the play, set in the office of a new prefect in a provincial town, shows us His Excellency de Caro, the prefect, Giacomo Franci, his secretary, and Veronesi, the doorman, who are forced to endure the visit of an actor, the director of a theater troupe, Oreste Campese. Thus begins a long and rather theoretical dialogue – sometimes even didactic – about theater, about the social condition of the actor, about the causes of the crisis in which theater finds itself. (…)

This first part, with all its plea in defense of theatrical art, is nothing more than a theorem whose artistic solutions will be solved in the second part. Oreste Campese did not come to the new prefect to request small material facilities, but to invite him to the theater, thus setting a good example for the other inhabitants. However, the prefect – although he played theater in his youth – no longer has time for such trifles, he has the high mission of administering the temporal things of everyday reality. Annoyed by this refusal, the director of the small troupe – whose theater has just burned down – draws the prefect's attention to the lessons that can be learned from theatrical art, even for his earthly concerns. He also does not forget to draw his attention to the fact that he managed to save a few beards, mustaches, and the makeup kit from the fire and that – taking the list of names of those registered in the audience „by chance” – he could send him the disguised actors, and the prefect would not be able to distinguish them from the real people. (…) From this moment on, through the entry into the scene/reality of Dr. Quinto Basseti, Father Salvati, Teacher Lucia Petrella, and the sacristy, the play demonstrates the validity of the well-known phrase of art – mirror of life. Mixing in indecipherable doses the realism of art with the fiction of reality, the play makes it impossible for us to distinguish art from life, a moment tense to the maximum by the real death, faked – we do not know – of the pharmacist. Art and life join hands in a chain whose limits cannot and should not be drawn. So, as much art, as much life and… vice versa.” (Ioan F. Pop in „Noua Gazetă de Vest”, no. 147, Year III (no. 44), November 2 – 8, 1994)

Distribution:

His Excellency the Diamond:  Eugen Harizomenov
Giacomo Franci:  Dorin Presecan
Veronese:  Tiberiu Covaci
Oreste Campese:  Ion Tomorrow
Quinto Bassetti:  Ion Abrudan
Father Salvati:  Petre Panait
Lucia Petrella:  Ileana Iurciuc
Gerolamo Pica:  Eugen Tugulea
A mountaineer:  Marcel Popa
His wife:  Mariana Presecan
A paraclyser:  George Voinese

Technical director: Florin Popescu
Prompter: Iuliana Chelu
Lighting: Iosif Balogh, Laviniu Goron
Sound: Sorin Domide