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On a dimly lit stage the actors appear like a bas-relief, forming a sculptural group to the tune of “Gymnopédie n. 1” by Erik Satie, and a powerful classicism breaks into the fragments of the past. It is the first image of “Cahiers d’Écriture”, two preparatory studies for “À la Recherche du Temp Perdu” by Marcel Proust, written and directed by Marco Filiberti who chose the Teatro degli Avvaloranti in Città della Pieve for this first, important debut. A theatrical project developed over five years and modulated, in the first instance, in a performance and some studies, these “Cahiers”, in fact, which lead to the staging of the entire “Recherche” divided into three parts: the first two, presented separately at a distance from each other, with the third and final part they will enter the representation of a single “happening” articulated over three consecutive days. A production still in progress, led by Dedalus with Le Vie del Teatro, in collaboration with Quaderni Proustiani.
A show for seven volumes
The transposition of the masterpiece makes use of a dialectical relationship between the director and the Proustian scientific-literary world; Filiberti’s work is proposed as the cartoon of a painter’s canvas, first there is the drawing then the work will come. Three archetypes give a graphic trait but the syntax is common; the first Cahier is thought “On jealousy or the illusion of possession of another human being”. The mythology of love, which for the writer is deceptive, lasts only a moment, the time of passion/jealousy, like that of Swann for Odette, of Charlus for Morel, of the Narrator for Albertine/ Alfred Agostinelli, represented in a doubles game, female/male. Theater borders on art and becomes an emblem of classicism; for Proust, who shuts himself up at home for fifteen years to complete La Recherche, art is salvific. In the novel, Berma, already seriously ill, gives a reception for one last performance of Racine’s “Phèdre” to please her capricious daughter, but no one will show up. The same daughter and her husband will abandon her to reach the Guermantes’ living room where she will be able to listen to the mediocre Rachel declaiming a symbolist text. It is the Parisian fashion of the moment, the new art no longer needs talent, it is not immortal because it lives only in the present. Abandoned by her arid daughter, the great interpreter Berma/Phèdre/Racine remains alone, “voiced” by the Narrator/Marcel in symbiotic identification, with her misunderstood and guilty love for the handsome Hippolytus, epitome of all the simulacra which, denying themselves, affirm their inconsistency.
Music for Marcel
In every work by Filiberti, music is the absolute protagonist, alongside the word, the action, the movement created by the choreographer Emanuele Burrafato who transforms the actor into a presence that goes beyond diction, magnetic and elusive: and, for this, becomes unforgettable. Like a veteran actress, music accompanies the stage writing at all times, placing space, story, roles, because no piece is random, each musical phrase introduces the feeling. The Narrator reviews his aesthetic infatuations such as the aristocracy, his youthful ideas of art, Gilberte, Oriane de Guermantes. Each painting has a composition chiseled by an intense and unique recitation, each piece of the mosaic in progress approaches the other. There are no scenes, the costumes, all white, do not want to place Proust’s work in a defined time to push us all to a continuous search towards “Time found”. Marco Filiberti has an extraordinary ability to work with actors with whom he has been collaborating for about a decade and who have already been appreciated, among other things, in his latest film “Parsifal”.
Proust LA RECHERCHE Filiberti 2022-2027, “Cahiers d’Écriture”, two preparatory studies for “À la Recherche du Temp Perdu” by Marcel Proust, written and directed by Marco Filiberti