New Translation Development – Italy

“…a deeply poetic reflection on our way of communicating and on the place of human beings in the world, thanks to the skillful translation work of Carolina Migli…A concrete hope that accessibility and inclusion can become a priority focus for Italian theater.” – Micaela Ghisoni, www.piacenzasera.it

Teatro di Grazzano Visconti presents
Bouche Theatre Collective, ChezActors, Global Hive Labs. & Piacenza Kultur Dom

ABOUT
Silence/ Silenzio…
A title that already holds a world within it.
A workshop exploring the threshold between word and gesture, language and silence.

The journey was born from the desire to create the Italian for the stage — to let the words of Trina Davies’ play Silence come alive in their Italian version, reshaped for performance.  This laboratory weaves together new translation development, expressive reading, active translation, and direction and concept exploration –  deepening the themes of non-verbal communication and linguistic inclusion.

SYNOPSIS
It only takes one spark of love to change the world forever. Mabel Hubbard Bell was a strong, self-assured woman—bright, passionate, and a complete original. Despite a near-fatal case of childhood scarlet fever that cost her the ability to hear, she learned to talk and lip-read in multiple languages. At nineteen, she married a young inventor named Alexander Graham Bell and became the most significant influence in his life. Mabel’s unique perspective on her remarkable life, and beautiful and true love story about how we communicate.

CREATIVE & PRODUCTION TEAM
Writer: Trina Davies | Translator, Director, & Creative Producer (It): Carolina Migli | Creative Producer (Canada) & Cross Cultural Dramaturg: Jack Paterson | Featuring: Pietro Fenucci, Mattia Fragassi, Giulia Gleason, Tonia Lavarone, Rosarita Mannina, Romana Ponzini, & Sara Vukelič.

Meet the Translation Team

Trina Davies | Playwright (Canada)

Trina Davies is a playwright based in Vancouver BC Canada. Trina’s award-winning plays include Shatter, Multi User Dungeon, The Auction, The Bone Bridge and Waxworks. Her play The Romeo Initiative was a finalist for Canada’s top literary prize the Governor General’s Literary Award for Drama 2012 and was the winner of the National Enbridge Prize for Established Artist. Her plays have been performed across Canada and in a number of other countries including the United States, Germany, Italy, and India. Her work has been translated into Italian and German. She has participated in artist residencies at the Stratford Festival in Ontario, Banff Centre for the Arts, the Playwrights Theatre Centre and the Bella Vita Playwrights Retreat in Italy. She is currently working towards the world premiere of her play Grand Ghosts in the Fall of 2022. Grand Ghosts is a large-scale piece about the mysterious disappearance of theatre tycoon Ambrose Small directed by Siminovitch Prize-winning director Jillian Keiley for The Grand London. Trina is a member of the Alberta Playwrights Network and the Playwrights Guild of Canada. www.trinadavies.com

Carolina Migli | Translator (Italy)

Carolina Migli is a Writer, Director, Actor and Translator. She studied ballet at the Accademia Domenichino da Piacenza (Italy), acting at the Gaiety school of acting (Ireland) & the TEATRODUE National Theatre in Parma (Itlay). She has worked with the Europa Theatre Festival, The Verona Shakespearean Festival, Viterbo’s Festival and the Summer Solstice festival. worked in London, France, Spain, Hungary, Denmark and was assistant director to Tim Stark (Royal National Theatre) for four years.

She is also the artistic director of ChezActors with a company of 25 professional theatre artists, and the Associate responsible for International Outreach at Teatro Trieste 34. Currently, she collaborates with Noveteatro theatre company in Northern Italy, ChezArt circle of artists, ICON women artist group and Coming Out Association. Translations include: Victor Lodato’s The bread of winter & Motherhouse, Peter Gill’s Small change, and Philip St.John’s The Sylvias.

Director/ Translator Notes

It is no secret that older artists might face age-related physical and cognitive changes. However, far greater impediments to their successful participation in the arts are the social stigmas of ageism and ableism.

On this project, we explored forms and aesthetics specifically from tools to support Senior artists in performance in rural touring. By “bringing the production to the performer”, we asked “what new is created when we make access integral to creation, design, rehearsal, and presentation processes?” And by doing so – draw attention to the needs of our ageing population in an intergenerational conversation and illuminate the experience of seniors’ day to day living.

The Creatus Project “Bakes Access & Accommodation into Creation”. This is done by identifying the barriers and needs of the senior performer creatively and structurally, addressing these barriers, and then integrating the solutions into all aspects of production.

Reimaging the production to elder actor Allan Toots, we decentralised memory from product, added memory prompts developed with Al (ex. set, props, sound cues, media, etc.), and created new text and staging to meet his accommodation. This “Artist First Approach” means each show is unique the unique performer.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of:

Ingrid Turk, Kaeden Atkinson-Hill, Upintheair Theatre, Western Gold Theatre, Presentation House Theatre, & Supertitles.gr