Donizetti Theatre Foundation
Prose Season 2025-2026

Harlequin dumb for fright
a show by Stivalaccio Teatro
March 7 to 15 at the Donizetti Theatre

Harlequin, the most popular mask of the Commedia dell’Arte, is coming to the Donizetti Theater, where from Saturday, March 7 to Sunday, March 15, the Stivalaccio Teatro company’s show is on stage Harlequin dumb with fright, as part of the Donizetti Theatre Foundation’s Prose Season 2025-2026. The show is inspired by the canovaccio Arlequin muet par crainte by Luigi Riccoboni and features the original subject and direction by Marco Zoppello. On stage: Sara Allevi, Katiuscia Bonato, Marie Coutance, Matteo Cremon, Michele Mori, Stefano Rota, Pierdomenico Simone, Maria Luisa Zaltron and Marco Zoppello.

One of the most frequently performed canovacci in early 18th-century Paris is revived for the first time in modern times by the Venetian company Stivalaccio Teatro: Il muto per spaventento is a great homage to the Commedia dell’Arte and the all-Italian ability to make a virtue of necessity. 1716: After about fifteen years of forced exile, the Comici Italiani finally return to prominence in the Paris theater and do so with a respectable company. Luigi Riccoboni aka Lelio, leader of the troupe, surrounds himself with the best performers from the boot including, for the first time in France, the Vicenza-born Harlequin Tommaso Visentini(nomen omen), ready to replace the late and beloved Evaristo Gherardi. But Visentini did not speak French, an inexcusable failing for audiences in the capital. And it is here that Riccoboni’s genius emerges in inventing an original plot where the Bergamasque servant becomes mute…out of fright!

Harlequin dumb with fright is a show where play, invention, love, fear and drama mingle among the immovable grimaces of the masks. Where plots entangle on misunderstanding and slowly unravel through the fingers of the characters. But if these slender plots, if this surreal and fantastic world, a distant echo of an Italian theatrical splendor, eclectic balancing act on the edge of history and tradition, if these ethereal figures allow one to indulge in a weightless and timeless joy, perhaps in that very moment one will find a shred of poetry.

Stivalaccio Theatre is involved in popular theater, Commedia dell’Arte, children’s theater and street art.

The company is dedicated to the dissemination of theater through the production of shows, training and the organization of festivals and reviews in the wake of a popular theater populated by people, ideas, lights, looks and stories to tell. Founded in 2007, the company has produced shows that have been hosted within the major distribution circuits, festivals and domestic and foreign theaters.

In November 2023, at Teatro Gobetti in Turin, the company received the ANCT – National Association of Theater Critics award in recognition of its work. In February 2024, the company was chosen by the Teatro Stabile del Veneto to perform on the stage of the Teatro Goldoni in Venice during the week of carnival celebration, with Harlequin mute for fright. With the same show, Stivalaccio Teatro was a guest in 2024 at the Théâtre Hébertot in Paris, for two days of events in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute in Paris and the Sorbonne Université. Stivalaccio Teatro was nominated for the 2024 Ubu Award in the Special Awards category for its significant work in revitalizing and reinventing the Commedia dell’Arte tradition and popular forms of theater. This nomination underscores how the company’s artistic research skillfully interweaves past and present, bringing masks and archetypes back to the stage with a contemporary sensibility that speaks to today’s audiences. An important recognition as a contribution to the enhancement of Italian theatrical heritage.