Each figure requires one operator who stands between the wings, which are about up to his waist and so solid that he can lean his elbows on them and reach comfortably more than halfway across the stage. There are four openings between the wings, and thus there can be eight puppets on the stage at once, operated by eight manipulators, four on each side. This could not be done with the life-sized marionettes in Catania, which
were all operated from behind, and never came forward. At Trapani the stage was much deeper in proportion, and the flies from which the scenery descended were high above the heads of the operators, so that the figures could walk about backwards and forwards all over the stage. The footlights were in the usual place in front of the curtain, and during the performance boys got up from their seats in the front row and lighted their cigarettes at them.
I had not nearly completed my investigations; but, fearing we might be in the way, we returned to the front and inquired about play-bills. There was only one in the house, posted up near the box-office; we went and inspected it—
Teatro di Marionette.
Per questa sera darà 2 recite
la prima alle 5½ la seconda alle 8
Pugna fra Sacripante e il Duca d’Avilla—
Ferraù uccide Medoro e acquista Angelica—
Morte di Sacripante per mani di Ferraù—
Morte di Angelica.Marionette Theatre.
This evening two performances will be given
The first at 5.30, the second at 8
Fight between Sacripante and the Duke of Avilla—
Ferraù kills Medoro and gains possession of Angelica—
Death of Sacripante at the hands of Ferraù—
Death of Angelica.
There was a pleasant-looking, retiring young man in the box-office, who was pointed out to me as “Lui che parla”—the one who speaks. They said he was a native of Mount Eryx and a shoemaker by trade.
We returned to our places and sat talking, smoking, eating American pea-nuts and waiting. The audience, which consisted of men of the class of life to which Mario belonged, all knew one another; most of them met there every evening. A subscription for one month costs three lire and entitles the holder to one performance a day, the performance at 8 being a repetition of that at 5.30.
The play now being performed is The Paladins of France; it was written by Manzanares in Italian prose and is in three volumes. It does not always agree with the other versions of the same story; but that is only as it should be, for romances have always been re-written to suit the audience they are intended for. It has been going on about four months, that is, since last October, when it began with Pipino, Re di Francia ed
Imperatore di Roma, the father of Carlo Magno, and it will continue day after day till May, like the feuilleton in a journal. During the hot weather there is no performance in this theatre; but the same story will be taken up again next October and is long enough to last through two winters. It could last longer, but they bring it within reasonable limits by removing some of the boredom. It concludes with the defeat and death of Orlando and the paladins at Roncisvalle.
The portion of the story appointed for the evening’s performance was in five acts, divided into a large number of very short scenes, and if I did not always know quite clearly what was going on, that was partly due to the distracting uproar, for nearly every scene contained a fight, and some contained several, the shortest lasting well over a minute. Whoever had been employed to shorten the story would have earned the thanks of one member of the audience if he had acted upon Pococurante’s remarks to Candide about the works of Homer. He ought not to have left in so many combats; they were as like one another and as tedious as those in the Iliad, besides being much
noisier, at least we are not told that the Homeric heroes were accompanied by a muscular pianist, fully armed, and by the incessant stamping of clogged boots. Nevertheless the majority of the audience enjoyed the fights, for no Sicilian objects to noise.