OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2009

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 The show must go on...
But can it?
Entering the theatre you feel almost like you are in-
truding. Instead of being fooled by huge stage-tricks,
fake backgrounds of mountains, a living room in the
sixties or any other setting, this stages shows you
back stage. ‘Opening Night’ is a new theatre play by
Ivo van Hove, based on the film of the same name by
John Cassavetes. The film made in 1977 is not the
first film Ivo van Hove converted into a theatre play,
the past years this has become part of his brand. Sto-
ries with complex characters, inner battles and with-
out a lot of change in settings, become even more im-
pressive during a live act. Examples of his conversions
are ‘Scenes from a Marriage’ by Igmar Bergman and
‘Angels in America’ by Tony Kushner. Though ‘Open-
ing Night’ is one of the more complex conversions so
far because it actually contains live video images of
the actors while they are playing.
The play in the play
The play tells the story of Myrtle (Elsie de Brauw),
leading actress in the broadway-play ‘The second
wife’. Myrtle has a lot of difficulty playing her role,
because this character is a woman struggling with
getting older. But she doesn’t completely collapses
until a devoted young fan dies in front of her eyes in
an accident. This makes her feel useless. What is she
still doing on stage? Faking grief? Try-outs fail, and
drama’s occur when she walks offstage in the middle
of a scene, changes all her lines, and starts talking to
her public directly about how ridiculous her co-actor
looks with his fake mustache. When she’s offstage in
the dressing room, or at home with a glass of wine,
she starts talking to the ghost of her dead fan, Nancy
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by Rosa Plijnaar
(Hadewych Minis). Maybe Nancy can help her to un-
derstand the character she has to play. How was to
be young and sexy? And how do you change over the
years? But what started out as a good idea, turns 180
degrees when she becomes more and more dependent
on Nancy. She drinking more and more to forget her
problems, and when the premiere of her play ap-
proaches, there’s only one thing left to do. Completely
drunk she stages a fiscal fights with Nancy and even-
tually ‘kills’ her imagined help. She ends up playing a
magnificent premiere while giving the text and there-
fore the play a twist to her own liking.
Theatre families
But even more than the underlying battles Myrtle
fights with herself, her relationships with her direc-
tor, ex-husband and leading male, and producer are
complicated enough by themselves. The story of a
theatre-family which completely collapses when their
main star loses it. Ivo van Hove explains in an inter-
view this is exactly what makes this play interesting. A
sneak peak behind the scenes of an ordinary play. The
director who always tries to make and keep everybody
happy; The producer who just has to make money in
the end; The play writer who feels nobody understood
what she really wanted to say with her play; and hair/
make-up personnel and stage managers who feel they
are the only ones really understanding what the actors
need, but do not have the power make this happen. The theatre play ‘Opening Night’
by the Toneelgroep Amsterdam
The setting
(Theatre Company Amsterdam) and
The stage setting and decors create the possibility to
NTGent (National Theatre Gent).
understand when you are seeing ‘Opening Night’ and
when they are playing ‘The second wife’. One hundred
Concept: Ivo van Hove
audience members sit stage right as the audience of Leading roles: Elsie de Brauw, Jacob Derwig,
the play in the play. On top of this construction, the Hadewych Minis and Fedja van Hûet.
video screens placed all over the stage and theatre Seen: 26 August 2009,
makes you feel you are watching a live documentary City Theatre Amsterdam, The Netherlands
and making-of. Ivo van Hove decided on purpose not Tour until June 2010
to see the actual film of Cassavetes, but to work from Info: www.toneelgroepamsterdam.com
his screenplay to avoid comparison. It’s refreshing to
see that theatre and video-images can work together,
not just for aesthetics, but to support the goal, mes-
sage and feeling of the play. If you know what a
theatre-family works like, this play will give you a lot
of laughs of recognition. Know what it takes when the
show must go on...

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[Images (c) Jan Versweyveld]
Contemporary art is finally reaching the traditional
lands of Sicily. In February 2009, with the opening
of Palazzo Riso, the new regional contemporary art
museum, we have witnessed the most significant event,
from both the national and international point of view.
But to be clear, we already had in the last few years
some innovative galleries and private institutions that
carried on a discussion about art from a contemporary
perspective.
The new initiative of Azienda Agricola Mandranova,
a small agrotourism company near Agrigento, is one
such example. They chose to dedicate some spaces of
the farmhouse to contemporary art. The project started
in June, through a partnership with a young and prom-
ising contemporary art gallery from Milano, AreaB. The
Di Vincenzo family, that own and manage the company,
approached this new challenge zestfully. The old han-
gar, that only a few months earlier was jam-packed with
olive oil processing equipment, turned into an open-
space gallery surprisingly suitable for contemporary
art. Currently, a collective exhibition with a selection of
young Italian artists from AreaB gallery (Vanni Cuoghi,
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Paolo De Biasi, Massimo Gurnari, Tiziano Soro and Siva)
is being held in the space. The location is very sugges-
tive, thanks to the contrasts that emerge between the
surrounding countryside and the inner exhibition set
up. Guests generally come from outside Italy, usually
from USA or Britain, and are often surprised and aston-
ished
CONTEMP
by
this
unex-
pected
ISLA
vision.
Between July and August anoth-
er interesting project took place,
more linked to the promotion of By: Giovann
young Sicilian artists. The first step
involved a collaboration with Marco Bonafè , a young
artist from Palermo. The artist spent a short period in
residence, so as to develop some work linked with the
territory. The exhibition ALTER-ECO is the final output
of this experience. It is a collection of three different
interventions, all site-specific. Using natural elements
 and old furniture found around the ruins of the Di
Vincenzo country, Marco gave new meanings, and new
life, to something that was supposed to be dead.

Il Giardino del Campiere, the great installation inside

the old Frantoio, honors the dialectic between natural

PORARY and
arti-
ficial,

AND
light
and shadow, stillness and
movement. All the elements are
in a charming equilibrium, creating
ni Saladino a special atmosphere inside the room
that captures every one who enters.

Pennate, the installation placed inside the common

spaces of the main building, aims to alter a familiar
setting, destabilizing the vision of the viewers, giv-
ing shape to a sort of surreal corner.

Last but not Least, Famiglia Di Vincenzo Don Tan-

credi, is the most moderate and apparently ironic
intervention. The inclusion of a picture of an old
codger (found by Marco in a local street market)
among those of the Di Vincenzo ancestors could
seem at a glance just a game of contrasts, but in
reality it goes much deeper than that. Don Tan-
credi, a name borrowed from the Gattopardo, a
novel written by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa,
is not an accidental reference. The agrotourism
farm is situated in the Palma di Montechiaro
neighborhood, where the majority of the novel
takes place. Within the story, Don Tancredi is
certainly the most innovative character, in-
clined to change but at the same time aware
of his origins. In my opinion, this is exactly
the right mood to have in order to keep on
going with a grave and concrete discussion
about contemporary art in Sicily.

www.palazzoriso.it
www.mandranova.it
www.areab.org

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