Antoni Cimolino is directing this year’s Grand Magic not only because of the modernity of the piece, but because of “a gift from the other side” that he received.
Written by Neopolitan Eduardo De Filippo in 1948, Grand Magic is a new translation started by the late John Murrell, finished by Donato Santeramo, and directed by Antoni Cimolino for the 2023 Stratford Festival Season.
Cimolino is the director of the Stratford Festival. He told StratfordToday that he and Murrell, an esteemed American-Canadian playwright, always admired De Filippo’s work together. Murrell was undergoing treatment for cancer just prior to the pandemic and worked on a translation for Grand Magic as an activity just for himself.
He finished and sent the translation to Cimolino right before he passed away – and the pandemic took over the world.
“The opening months of the pandemic were so absorbing and so terrifying and I didn't have the heart to go back to this translation,” Cimolino said. “I just let it sit there in my office, at home, on a shelf in an envelope.”
After another project fell apart, Cimolino found himself looking for a play that would matter to a modern audience. He came back to Grand Magic and Murrell’s work.
“I went to that envelope that John had sent me and I opened it up, and it was a complete draft of the play. If he and I were working on it, we would have three or four drafts of a translation, but this one was complete and it was a brilliant starting point.
“It was a gift, a gift from the other side.”
It was more than just that gift from Murrell that inspired Cimolino to take on this play. De Filippo is one of the premiere Italian artists of the twentieth century, as Cimolino claimed.
“If you have to find 20 great playwrights from the 20th century, he'd be in that number,” Cimolino argued, saying that De Filippo’s success may come from his background. “He grew up in the theatre, in the vaudeville years in the 1920s, and he was the illegitimate son of a very famous actor. So his whole life was in the theatre.”
This comedy tells the story of a master illusionist that has fallen from grace and reduced to performing magic at a seaside resort. After performing one trick, one guest escapes their reality while another parses through what is reality and what is illusion.
Ultimately, Grand Magic is about a person’s ability to believe in another person and their willingness to be deceived. Belief, truth, and the line between them are at the heart of this play.
The play takes place in De Filippo’s backyard: Naples. Cimolino said that the Neopolitan spirit is vital to this work.
“DeFilippo had a famous saying,” Cimolino shared. “He said ‘Neapolitans want a significant evening in the theatre that's over very quickly.’ So the play sticks to your ribs. Each act is over before you know it. Every act is very different … It's a bit like a fantastic puzzle that you're solving all the way through.”
The spirit of Naples is intrinsic to De Filippo’s writings and that spirit is evident in Grand Magic. Naples is one of the oldest cities in Europe, having been established by the ancient Greeks. Its long history is one of occupation. Despite its long history, they very often did not rule themselves.
That is true especially during De Filippo’s time, when it was occupied by the Nazis.
Because of occupation, Neopolitans found a way of surviving, often through deception. As Cimolino said, deception and the truth are at the heart of Grand Magic. They are also at the heart of our modern day. With more and more ways to quantify and measure the world around us, we somehow have a more tenuous grasp on reality.
Cimolino said that is what audience-goers should expect from the play: the unexpected.
“Things are not what they seem,” he promised. “When you go you think that things are one way and very quickly they keep transforming and becoming something else … the play has a kind of magic of its own.”
Grand Magic begins previews today at the Tom Patterson Theatre. Opening night is June 3.
To purchase tickets, visit the Stratford Festival’s website.
Director’s Notes is an ongoing series from StratfordToday, featuring interviews with Stratford Festival directors; discussing their project, their scope, and their goals for this year’s production.
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