Scritto e rappresentato nel 1933, Quando si è qualcuno è un dramma autobiografico. Un celebre scritore- Pirandello appunto- ricerca invano la purezza, la libertà inventiva, la genuinità. Prigioniero del personaggio che gli altri gli hanno costruito, impossibilitato a infrangere gli schemi, finisce col rassegnarsi a una cristallizzazione che è preludio alla fissità della morte. Espressione di una crisi ma insieme di una presa coscienza, Quando si è qualcuno precede di poco la grande visione dei Giganti della Montagna, di cui La favola del figlio cambiato costituisce la premessa logica. ( )

"Liolà."

Act 1 starts with harvest almond-shucking, Act 2 with onion picking by three kids of Liola, all from different mothers, whom he doesn't marry, though he cares for the kids. (In the play we meet three boys, Tinino, Calicchio, Pallino.) Act 3, also harvest time, but no one comes when asked by Zia Croce, though they do for La Moscardina, who’s always running. She cites the proverb, “Gallina chi va e gira, col gozzo pieno si retira”(85).
In the first scene we meet three young country girls, “contadine,” Cruz, Luzza and Nela, who sing in chorus a Maria folksong as they crack almonds for Zia Croce’s stand.
Mita is the young wife of Uncle (Zio) Simone who wants to have a child. Three aunts in the play, Liolà’s mother Zia Ninfa, his cousin Zia Croce, and Gesa, aunt of Mita.
In Bruno’s play in 1582 I translated a couple dozen proverbs; here too there are quite a few, like “Chi cerca trova, e chi séguita vince”(87). Whoever seeks will find, and who follows, wins.
The play opens with almond harvest, and closes with grape harvesting for wine, same time of year, August and September. Liolà leads the harvesters, many of them kids, their hands linked, in song. One proverb, Playing music or singing is only wind; Liolà says he and the wind are brothers, they are both everywhere.
In the last act, the grapes’ ripening resonates with the ripening of the pregnant Tuzza and Mita, the young wife of the rich Signor Simone, whose cousin Zia Croce initiates the harvest unknown to the owner. Simone arrives at the harvest celebration in a grumpy mood, ready to cross-examine harvest leader Liolà on his wife’s pregnancy. Simone says he swears before Gesú he had boasted wrongly of a son, who was in fact, Liolà’s, “mi son vantato a torto del figlio che, in coscienza, è tuo”(101).
Liolà says he had offered to marry Tuzza, but she didn’t want him—probably because he’s a notorious womanizer. But he offers to take, and take care of Tuzza’s child, if Tuzza and her mother Zia Croce want him to. Tuzza answers with an act of violence, but no spoiler here. The three kids sing at the end, When you’re born, Three and one make four. “Tre e uno quattro! Gl’insegno a cantare!” I’ll teach you to sing.


"Così è (se vi pare)":

This play, beginning Pirandello’s major works, drawn from his novel on Frola and Ponza, was first performed in my daughter’s Milan, 1917; translated into French, staged in 1924, it succeeded and became part of the repertory at Comédie Française, as Chacun sa verité. The novel title asserts that both named characters are sui generis, so here’s the stage direction on one, Signora Frola, a beautiful old woman, modest but affable, “con uno grande tristezza negli occhi, ma un constanta dolce sorriso sulle labbra.” A sweet smile but sad eyes.

Who’s crazy? That’s the main theme. Ponza treats his suocera, Signora Frola, very well, pays for a city apartment, and often visits amicably; while her daughter Lina, his wife, Frola hasn’t seen for years. Ponza keeps her in the top floor where they can’t even speak in the courtyard as a well. Lina was in an asylum, maybe fetched from one at end, in a dark veil, mourning clothes. Was she both his 1st and 2nd wife, new marriage to accept her back into the house?

The townspeople look into this with legal authorities, the Prefect and Counselor Amalia. Frola thinks Ponza crazed, driven mad enough to pretend his second wife Giulia is Lina. Ponza reciprocates, thinks Frola crazed by the loss of her daughter.

The play begins and ends with an ironist, Laudisi, the brother of Counselor Amalia who wears a purple jacket with gold braiding. At the end, Ponza’s wife is fetched either from the top floor of his house, or from an asylum; she is dressed in mourning, with a black veil. Frola embraces her as her daughter, but it is not entirely clear. She asks to see under the veil, looks and leaves in silence.
Laudisi laughs at end…”You happy?” ( )

Peça siciliana de Pirandello. Foi escrita originalmente em siciliano, e traduzida posteriormente pelo próprio autor.
O tom é jocoso, e o autor chegou a dizer que não parecia uma peça sua. Conta a história de Liolà, Dom Juan provinciano. Em sua cidade mora a jovem órfã Mita, sua antiga amante, agora casada com o rico Simone Palumbo, que a culpa pela falta de filhos do casal. Outra jovem, Tuzza, começa um caso com Liolà e engravida. Recusando sua proposta de casamento, ela convence o velho Palumbo de que a criança é o seu esperado herdeiro. Liolà tentará equilibrar a situação e fazer justiça. ( )

Truth is a dark lady behind a black veil, who is nothing to herself.

A drama in 3 acts. ( )