Of Whitby and Commedia
Apr. 29th, 2009 11:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pallas_athenaWhitby was quiet, but far from boring. Sure, the place was empty and echoing without ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
wyte_phantom, orkamedies and esdi_leanne -- but there was time and space for conversation, wandering at leisure and generally doing weird things in the name of entertainment.
On Friday afternoon, I took my friend Zanni for a walk. Zanni looks something like this: he's a leather commedia mask that I found on my first and only trip to Venice, years ago, withmothninja (whose birthday it is today. Happy birthday, ninja!)
Ever since high school, commedia dell'arte has been a major source of happiness to me. It appeals to everything I like best about theatre. Say you're a travelling commedia player in the 1500s, about to go onstage: You know the character you're playing, you know the plot, you've worked out a few set jokes and physical comedy routines (known as lazzi) with your fellow players... but there's no script. What words you say when you step out onstage are completely down to you. I recommend the ones least likely to make the crowd of peasants out there start throwing rotten root vegetables.
Zanni (short for "Giovanni" in Venetian dialect; also the origin of our English word "zany") is sort of the primordial sludge from which all the other commedia characters evolved. The earliest forms of commedia had no real storyline: it would just be two or three Zannis playing jokes on each other for the cheapest of cheap laughs. But you (you're still a player, remember) have devised a sketch where one Zanni is master and the other servant. This bit is popular with the Italian peasant crowd, who identify with the put-upon servant, have a good laugh when he gets beaten, and laugh louder when he finally outfoxes his master at the end. This sketch is so much in demand that the "master" Zanni gets a new mask with white whiskers and a new name: Pantalone. Soon Pantalone has two Zannis serving him: one clever, one the fall guy. The clever servant, the guy who perpetually gets out of trouble by outwitting everyone, quickly becomes the star of the show. Suddenly he's sewn patches of all colours to his raggedy old costume, has a new mask (with a short nose, so he can do acrobatics) and a new name to match: Arlecchino. (A troupe of French players brazenly steal your idea, calling him Harlequin.)
You get the idea. Fast-forward half a century or so and we've gone from a stage-wagon in the country mud to an actual theatre in the city, and the simple sketches have evolved into an entire evening's worth of entertainment. Now there are WOMEN involved (scandalous!!) For example: the master, old Pantalone, has a beautiful daughter whom he wishes to marry off to his esteemed, rich and respectable friend the Doctor. But she has fallen desperately in love with handsome young Leandro, and begs the wily servant, Arlecchino, to carry him a note from her. Meanwhile, a ferocious Spanish Captain has arrived in town, and quickly starts wooing anything female on legs...
The lazzi have got a bit more complicated, but there's still no script. Going on, you know that this is the scene where you have to convince Pantalone that he's deathly ill so that he and the Doctor will be out of the way while the lovers escape... but how you do it is still up to you.
And at the bottom of the heap, there's still Zanni. When the other characters took on their distinguishing traits, Zanni was left with not much. He's now everyone's stupidest servant, the perpetual fall guy, with all the commedia character's desire for food, sex and money-- but without the wit to get any of those for himself.
So, on Friday, I became a solo Zanni for a day. I didn't plan much beforehand; just put on the mask/hat/headscarf and my most shapeless clothing, and went out, letting Zanni lead. (As anyone who's worn a mask knows, once you put it on, things change.) It was interesting, and although my stage-movement training is nothing special, I did manage a few lazzi which seemed to amuse passers-by.
Zanni seemed to like being out and about. He may, conceivably, poke his nose out the door again at some point. Who knows?
wyte_phantom, orkamedies and esdi_leanne -- but there was time and space for conversation, wandering at leisure and generally doing weird things in the name of entertainment.On Friday afternoon, I took my friend Zanni for a walk. Zanni looks something like this: he's a leather commedia mask that I found on my first and only trip to Venice, years ago, with
mothninja (whose birthday it is today. Happy birthday, ninja!)Ever since high school, commedia dell'arte has been a major source of happiness to me. It appeals to everything I like best about theatre. Say you're a travelling commedia player in the 1500s, about to go onstage: You know the character you're playing, you know the plot, you've worked out a few set jokes and physical comedy routines (known as lazzi) with your fellow players... but there's no script. What words you say when you step out onstage are completely down to you. I recommend the ones least likely to make the crowd of peasants out there start throwing rotten root vegetables.
Zanni (short for "Giovanni" in Venetian dialect; also the origin of our English word "zany") is sort of the primordial sludge from which all the other commedia characters evolved. The earliest forms of commedia had no real storyline: it would just be two or three Zannis playing jokes on each other for the cheapest of cheap laughs. But you (you're still a player, remember) have devised a sketch where one Zanni is master and the other servant. This bit is popular with the Italian peasant crowd, who identify with the put-upon servant, have a good laugh when he gets beaten, and laugh louder when he finally outfoxes his master at the end. This sketch is so much in demand that the "master" Zanni gets a new mask with white whiskers and a new name: Pantalone. Soon Pantalone has two Zannis serving him: one clever, one the fall guy. The clever servant, the guy who perpetually gets out of trouble by outwitting everyone, quickly becomes the star of the show. Suddenly he's sewn patches of all colours to his raggedy old costume, has a new mask (with a short nose, so he can do acrobatics) and a new name to match: Arlecchino. (A troupe of French players brazenly steal your idea, calling him Harlequin.)
You get the idea. Fast-forward half a century or so and we've gone from a stage-wagon in the country mud to an actual theatre in the city, and the simple sketches have evolved into an entire evening's worth of entertainment. Now there are WOMEN involved (scandalous!!) For example: the master, old Pantalone, has a beautiful daughter whom he wishes to marry off to his esteemed, rich and respectable friend the Doctor. But she has fallen desperately in love with handsome young Leandro, and begs the wily servant, Arlecchino, to carry him a note from her. Meanwhile, a ferocious Spanish Captain has arrived in town, and quickly starts wooing anything female on legs...
The lazzi have got a bit more complicated, but there's still no script. Going on, you know that this is the scene where you have to convince Pantalone that he's deathly ill so that he and the Doctor will be out of the way while the lovers escape... but how you do it is still up to you.
And at the bottom of the heap, there's still Zanni. When the other characters took on their distinguishing traits, Zanni was left with not much. He's now everyone's stupidest servant, the perpetual fall guy, with all the commedia character's desire for food, sex and money-- but without the wit to get any of those for himself.
So, on Friday, I became a solo Zanni for a day. I didn't plan much beforehand; just put on the mask/hat/headscarf and my most shapeless clothing, and went out, letting Zanni lead. (As anyone who's worn a mask knows, once you put it on, things change.) It was interesting, and although my stage-movement training is nothing special, I did manage a few lazzi which seemed to amuse passers-by.
Zanni seemed to like being out and about. He may, conceivably, poke his nose out the door again at some point. Who knows?