Monteverde stages 'Otello.' - Italian choreographer Fabrizio Monteverde

Dance Magazine, Dec, 1994 by Silvia Poletti

FLORENCE--Is there hope for Italian ballet? After the passing of its nineteenth-century ballet masters, Italian dance suffered a decline that prevented ballet from evolving here for a long time. A turning point for Italian dance came at the end of the 1980s, however, when the polymorphic choreographic movement dubbed "Nuova Danza Italiana" provided the first opportunity to identify Italy's future choreographers. Among them was a clever young Roman, who trained in contemporary dance after gaining experience as an actor and director: Fabrizio Monteverde,

From the start, Monteverde's works showed a predilection for literary sources whose dramatic depth kept him away from abstract formalism (his first success, La boule de neige, was based on Les enfants terribles of Jean Cocteau). And dramatic dance seems to be the only kind that can define his passionate and emotional poetics. Labeled a postromantic, Monteverde needs a dance language in which narrative gesture describes all the emotional struggles of life.

Monteverde now collaborates with Balletto di Toscana (BDT). Directed by Cristina Bozzolini and based in Florence, the twelve-member BDT is one of the most bold and interesting independent ballet companies in Italy. Working with BDT's classical dancers is giving Monteverde the chance to develop his own choreographic style, in which he mixes classical and contemporary techniques in order to convey emotions and tell stories.

After he created a dark and decadent cadets' ball entitled Era Eterna, set to Franz Schubert's Unfinished Symphony, in 1988, BDT awarded Monteverde its first evening-length production: Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet. Monteverde set the story in southern Italy after the Second World War, in a bloody and dark neorealist atmosphere inspired by movies like Luchino Visconti's Ossessione. The ballet was greatly acclaimed and BDT soloist Eugenio Scigliano and Alessandra Ferri later performed the bedroom pas de deux in a television movie produced by RAI (Italy's national television corporation). Monteverde conceived his Pinocchio (1990) as a little boy's progress in life, a Tanzspiel looking at The Seven Deadly Sins of Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht, and quoting from celebrated ballets.

The choreographer's new Otello for BDT was scheduled to have its premiere in the Teatro Pergolesi, Jesi (Ancona) on October 21. Again Shakespeare, again pure passions--absolute love and absolute hate--have inspired Monteverde. The choreographer's challenge here is to tell the story through pure movement, since none of Shakespeare's dramas depends more on words. In Otello very little action happens onstage; rather, the drama unfolds in Otello's mind. Monteverde intends to employ movie techniques onstage, incorporating dramatic details conceived as movie frames with help from lighting designer Carlo Cerri. With an original score by Federico Bonetti Amendola and sets and decor by Stefania Battaglia, Monteverde's Otello may be another important moment in the evolving history of Italy's young choreographic movement,

At presstime the company planned to take the production on tour to the Teatro Verdi in Florence (November 3-4), Sala Europa in Bologna (November 9), Teatro Manzoni in Pistoia (November 23-24), Teatro Valli in Reggio Emilia (December 28-29), Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa (February 22-25), and Teatro Comunale in Ferrara (on April 13).