Debut: Venice, La Fenice Theater, XXVII International Prose Theater Festival, 27 September 1968
| Direction | Luigi Squarzina |
| Set and costume | Gianfranco Padovani |
| Music | Fernando Cazzato Mainardi |
| Production | Teatro Stabile di Genova |
Characters and performers
| Sior Zamaria Testor, ie fabric manufacturer | Camillo Milli |
| Siora Domenica, his daughter | Lucilla Morlacchi |
| Sior Anzoletto, draftsman | Giancarlo Zanetti |
| Sior Bastian, a silk merchant | Eros Pagni |
| Siora Marta, his wife | Esmeralda Ruspoli |
| Sior Lazzaro, manufacturer of fabrics | Toni Barpi |
| Siora Alba, his wife | Elsa Vazzoler |
| Sior Augusto, fabric manufacturer | Gianni Fenzi |
| Siora Eleneta, his wife | Grazia Maria Spina |
| Siora Polonia, which ranks in gold | Wanda Benedetti |
| Sior Momolo, manganaro | Omero Antonutti |
| Madame Gatteau, old French embroiderer | Lina Volonghi |
| Cosmo, worker's assistant from Zamaria | Renzo Martini |
| Baldissera, worker's assistant from Zamaria | Sebastiano Tringali |
| Martin, worker's assistant from Zamaria | Luciano Razzini |
As he did with Euripides and Shakespeare, Squarzina makes Goldoni our contemporary, and makes the 1960s audience contemporary with great Goldonian theatre.
His adaptation of the Carnival is related to the cultural, social and political context of Venice in the second half of the 1700s, and to the playwright’s biography. Thus, while on the one hand it represents Goldoni’s strongly critical view of the bourgeoisie, on the other it highlights the playwright’s doubts as to the future of its reform, but also his pride over the results it had achieved. And thus Goldoni become our contemporary, because in the director’s adaptation, the autobiographical pieces are set “as a collective autobiography of a theatre generation,” while Goldonian reform becomes the project of innovation of the Italian theatre during the second post-war period, as carried out by the new-generation directors. Squarzina also acknowledges the “contemporaneity” of the Carnival, in Anzoletto-Goldoni’s departure towards Muscovy, seen as a “brain drain from Italy”. To clearly express the deep melancholy and the strong political provocation, the director inserts passages from the Mémoires into the play.
The production was accompanied by an essay of great depth with a title by the same name, in which Squarzina clarified the motivations for his interpretation. Both audiences and critics were highly enthusiastic.
We thank Teatro Nazionale di Genova for the concession of the use of photographic material.