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Odissee, Italiani sulle rotte del sogno e del dolore, is a performance created by the Compagnia delle Acque based on the incredible book written by Gian Antonio Stella, the editor and political, economic, and social correspondent for Il Corriere della Sera and also best-selling author of many books including La Casta (Rizzoli, 2007). Odissee plans to capture and focus the audience attention on the hopes and disappointments of the many Italian emigrants at the end of the 19th century who left their homeland to find fortune in faraway lands such as the-much-dreamed-of America. The performance alternates tales, authentic poetry, vintage documents, historical images and songs taken from the Italian folk tradition of the time. La Compagnia delle Acque has been a very prolific group founded by Gualtiero Bertelli (accordion, guitar, vocals), including Rachele Colombo (vocals and guitar), Paolo Favorido (piano), and Giuseppina Casarin (vocals), and represents one of the very few multimedia/folk theater groups to actually still include a socio-political message in every piece they masterfully construct and perform. Their clever social commentaries and political-economical remarks well blend into their heart-felt music and poetic voices, while leaving the audience with some meditative thoughts and strong imagery that will open their eyes to forgotten and hidden realities.
The performance, held at the Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimò at New York University on Friday October 27th, was a touching and enchanting event that I think succeeded in its intent and picked up from where Emanuele Crialese's film Nuovo Mondo (Golden Doors) left off. While on the big screen even the darkest moments were still detached and presented to us like a far away nightmare to forget about as soon as we exit the theater, Odissee told the stories that our grandparents and ancestors have attempted to let go of, but instead were haunted by forever. Those stories you only get glimps of in Crialese's film, while thanks to Gian Antonio Stella's commitment and the Compagnia's devotion and passion, they finally come alive through a brilliant mix of traditional signing, useful historic information and hard-to-find testimonies that have been buried with tears in foreign soils for generations. The music was well executed, the readings were full of sorrow but also desperate hope, the imagery powerful and unfiltered. It was a beautiful event that could teach the true history of our exodus and emigration process without the lies and the tacit false understanding that the promised land came at no cost. We can also learned so much about the original conditions of Italy at the end of the 19th century and later, information so painful that even in school sometimes it's held back or uncomfortably discussed. As much as I think the format the Compagnia delle Acque has chosen for this performance was appropriate, I do wish I could have seen a little bit more of a modern interpretation of the stage: a dancer's movements would have complemented greatly the imagery and the music which lacked a physical and tangible element, the same way the placement of the instruments on stage took too much of a central role in the aesthetics of the piece. The screen projection also creates too much distance between the viewer and the material, adding that element of institutionalized presentation that could serve both as positive and negative prop. If on one hand a PowerPoint slide presentation can be a hidden criticism of institutions and schools that don't make this material available, on the other hand it creates one more layer of separation. But considering the limitations dictated by the space itself, the voices, the guitar, the piano keys and the accordion filled that void with a strong emotional charge regardless.

Photos of the event available at: Flickr set

And a small video: