Maternal love and its possible pathological derivatives. This is the theme at the center of ‘The Mother’, a drama written in 2010 by the French Florian Zeller and the first chapter of a trilogy that also includes ‘The Father’ (2012) and ‘The Son’ (2018).
In The Mother Zeller investigates with extreme acuteness the theme of maternal love and the possible pathological consequences to which it can lead. The departure of her son, now an adult, is experienced by the woman as a real betrayal, as abandonment of the nest, to which is added a decline in conjugal love that has been underway for some time. The initial black comedy tone lets out more than a smile, due to the situations described and the mechanism of repetitions that Zeller establishes in the text, it slowly transforms into a ruthless drama that seems to be neither a real dream nor the banal reality of the present , but a hypnotic and cruel vertigo from which waking up is impossible.
Anna’s world is a place where she no longer recognizes herself, isolated by a family ménage that has expelled her. But doesn’t the responsibility for this loneliness also lie in having given up on her life? Isn’t giving up dreams, hopes and desires solely to dedicate oneself to one’s only son on whom one can pour out frustrations, remorse and ideals of love a path that dangerously inclines towards desperation?
Anna, the mother, is obsessed with a multiple reality, a sort of multiverse of the mind, in which realities are doubled, creating an illusion of constant authenticity in all narrative levels. But can one imagine an awakening from Anna’s memories? In her mother’s mind, dream sequences and hyper-realistic situations pile up. In the liquid and smooth society of Zygmunt Baumann and Byung Chul Han, the sense of guilt is no longer enough to keep their children close. In the pain of letting them go, for a mother, there is all the acceptance of her life in her becoming, there is letting go of a part of herself to be reborn in detachment.
The initial black comedy tone, which initially raises more than a smile, slowly transforms into a ruthless drama that seems neither a true dream nor banal reality, but a hypnotic and cruel vertigo from which waking up seems impossible.
Molierie Company
in co-production with
Theater of Naples – National Theater
and Accademia Perduta Romagna Teatri
present
Lunetta Savino
in
THE MOTHER
by Florian Zeller
with Andrea Renzi, Niccolò Ferrero and Chiarastella Sorrentino
directed by Marcello Cotugno
scenes Luigi Ferrigno
costumes Alessandra Benaduce
lighting design Pietro Sperduti
For info and tickets: teatrosalieri.it
