This is no Land of Toys

“While you look for answers about our future, what am I to do?” thus Pinocchio to his teacher, who replies he will look for further questions. Questions about in Davide Iodice’s show Pinocchio. Che cos’è una persona? (lit. ‘Pinocchio, what is a person?’) that 2025 Venice Theatre Biennale director Willem Dafoe wanted at all costs after seeing Iodice in Naples last September. First conceived as a study in 2023 and awarded the special UBU Award in 2024, the piece is about the different bodies of the pupils at Compagnia della Scuola Elementare del Teatro, affected by Down’s, Williams’, Asperger’s, or otherwise in the spectrum. Each is a possible Pinocchio, each precious and unreplaceable. “Pinocchio and its story seem to embody all the features of impenetrable, misunderstood adolescence, whose torment mirrors the capitulation of adult society. Pinocchio is different, he is all the different individuals, with their anarchy and their disruption.”

Featured image: Pinocchio. Che cos’è una persona? – Photo Renato Esposito