Show with the actor Paolo Ruffini’s company, Tuesday 7 May at 8.30 pm
On 7 May 2024 the show “Up and Down” arrives at the Mercadante Theater in Altamura, lioness of Puglia, thanks to Cobar Spa for a social initiative promoted and supported by the Altamura company as part of the Sustainability Plan which will be developed during of the three-year period 2024/2026.
The show is the story of a dream that turns into an adventure: a theater company made up of five actors with Down syndrome and one autistic who wants to accomplish a “normal” feat: create a great show and take it to the most prestigious theaters of Italy.
Eliminate discrimination by creating a symbolic embrace between “Special” kids with different abilities through art, in particular theatre, and the luckier people, sensitive to these social issues. This is the purpose of the show created by the actor Paolo Ruffini, whose intent is to commit himself to doing something for others and with others using time, emotions and diversity as personal enrichment.
UP & Down is a comical, disobedient and moving happening, which has relationships as its underlying theme, including the relationship with time, with emotions, with diversity. Through the filter of irony we investigate the ability and disability to happiness. A performance with surreal connotations and unexpected developments with a strong connotation of improvisation, which interrupts the theatrical liturgies and offers the public a real experience in which the distances between stage and audience are canceled out, and in the end actors and spectators find each other to share a revolutionary gesture: a big hug.
Through the filter of irony, the audience will be projected into a real experience in which the distances between stage and audience are canceled out, and in the end actors and spectators come together to share a revolutionary gesture: a big hug.
Local businesses sensitive to social and cultural issues were involved in the initiative, such as Maldarizzi Automotive, Eredi Maggi, Gruppo Simone, Tbike, Nova Consult, Terre Bradaniche, Sanrocco Carburanti, Oropan, Assintermedia, Pasta Lori, Mec Line, Porsche Bari , PanBiscò, Calderoni Martini, Tenuta Viglione, Top Service; voluntary associations and organizations such as Autism Friendly Altamura, Anffas Altamura, Special Olympics Team Puglia, associations that support initiatives to support the world of different abilities.
With this in mind, on May 7th at 8.30pm, the Mercadante Theater will become a place of socialization between the actors of the show Up & Down, the community and disabled children.
“Theatre, cinema, art, don’t know what to do with normality. Life itself does not ask us to be normal, life is a hymn to diversity: we are all differently normal and equally different. In this project we talk about ability and disability to happiness, beauty, wonder towards the things we experience every day. Working with these actors I discovered a familiarity with life that they possess and that we so-called normal people, however, have lost. I learned the true essence of resilience: a limit that turns into an opportunity” – declares the Italian actor, television presenter, director, screenwriter and theater producer, Paolo Ruffini, who in the show “Up and Down” as a comedian succeeds to be both funny and authoritative to call the kids to order on stage and also in real life… hopefully!
We look forward to seeing many of you at the show to experience this great emotion together.
