JOHAN PADAN AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA. To 8 June.
London
JOHAN PADAN AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
by Dario Fo, translated by Mario Pirovano
Outlaw Theatre company at Riverside Studios (Studio 2) To 8 June 2002 (3 June, performance in Italian)
Mon-Sat 7.45pm
Runs 2hr 30min One interval.
TICKETS 020 8237 1111
www.riversidestudios.co.uk
Review Emma Dunford 30 May
You’ll either love it or you’ll hate it!Who would have thought a trip to the theatre could ever be compared to a bite of marmite on toast? Watching audience reaction to Mario Pirovano as he pranced about the stage delivering his one-man cabaret, I fell decidedly amongst the marmite lovers, but there was a sizeable proportion of haters too: Dario Fo has excelled in concocting a recipe for the acquired taste.
His monologue takes us on a remarkable journey to the New World as Johan Padan escapes the Spanish Inquisition - in Venice it was ‘burning his bum’, in Seville ‘burning his balls’. Leaving behind his Italian lover, a blasphemous fortune-teller, he embarks with Columbus, sides with the Indian savages against the true savagery of the Spanish Conquistadors and after many a fantastical adventure, accepts the role of a god amongst natives - bestowed following his dabble in the art of miracle-making.
Mario Pirovano, amused by his own comedy and disturbed by his own anger on this journey, is a consummate player of political satire. His performance is so believable – an Italian accent that leaves him tongue-tied; embellishments and regressions which are so much a part of everyday storytelling – that it seems inconceivable any one part of his script could be written down and learned from the page. Pirovano has his audience (those who enjoy their marmite) fixated as he relishes and revels in the oral tradition. The story is a fabrication, but as he elaborates on situations - at times debasing images to a grotesque, Swiftian level - the audience’s imagination is stimulated and becomes as jumbled and unsynchronised as the gestures on stage.
No one could say the performance lacks energy. No one could say the performer lacks an unprecedented talent. What can be said, however, is that the first half seems a lot more captivating than the second. I put this down to a novel and idiosyncratic performance that's no longer quite so novel after the interval. In his story Dario Fo acts out a literal firework display and there could be no better way to describe the bangs and crashes of this theatrical performance.
Cast:
Mario Piravano
Director/Designer: Dario Fo
2002-06-02 10:00:59