In joining the world of melodrama, puppets are not just interpreters instead of singers in flesh and bone, they are a particular language, a world built by conventions, archetypes, complex aesthetic and philosophical goals.

When they replace human beings, object-actors overturn the terms of theatrical "ceremony": not imitation of the gesture of man and his physicality, but a symbol of a metaphysical reality, a sign of floating form that comes to life through the poetry of matter. With the movement the puppets bring surprise, illusion, and magic. They ask for complicity and abandonment. They promise the dream.

Ancient superstitions, ancestral fears, frightening visions flourish between dense walls and old stones, between Gothic arches and warrior banners, between cliffs and habitats where gitane songs and predictions of misfortune ring out. In the notes of music of Verdi all this is transformed into a constant echo that is the backdrop to the tragic love story of Manrico and Leonora, the fervent jealousy of the Count of Luna, and the ravaging conviction of Azucena's pursuit of vengeance.

The task entrusted to puppets is not to revive the overwhelming emotions that romances, duets, and concertos return fully. But it is a feature of their theater, which is popular, to turn into visual situations the atmosphere that the famous melodies describe with miraculous brush strokes full of pathos, whether it be fears of the family, the incomprehensible tragedy that dominates the protagonists, spectral visions Of Gypsy.

Director: Eugenio Monti Colla

Puppeteers: Eugenio Monti Colla, Franco Citterio, Maria Grazia Citterio, Piero Corbella, Camillo Cosulich, Debora Coviello, Carlo Decio, Cecilia Di Marco, Tiziano Marcolegio, Sheila Perego, Giovanni Schiavolin, Paolo Sette

Voices: Loredana Alfieri, Marco Balbi, Roberto Carusi, Mariagrazia Citterio, Fabrizio De Giovanni, Lisa Mazzotti,. Gianni Quillico, Franco Sangermano, Giovanni Schiavolin

Scenography: Franco Citterio

Costumography: Eugenio Monti Colla

Country: Italy