class="">Donka – „Perpetual wonder“

The National Theatre Festival is proud to present ,for the first time in Romania, “Donka- A letter to Chekhov”, written and directed by Daniele Finzi Pasca, produced by the Finzi Pasca Company Switzerland and the International Chekhov Theatre Festival , co-produced by Théâtre Vidy / Lausanne.

The NTF showings are set to take place on the 29th and 30th of October ,from 20:30 PM, at the Studio Hall of the National Theatre in Bucharest.

“Donka- a letter to Chekhov” premiered on the 29th of January 2010 at the Mossoviet Theatre of Moscow, (having been ordered up by the International Chekhov Theatre Festival) where it was considered by the British weekly The Stage as “The Best Show” and “The Greatest Moment of the Year 2012”.

Employing the magic of circus, Pasca brings homage to Chekhov through a veritable visual event, a show of dance, acrobatics, juggling and fragile balancing acts .

Finzi Pasca immerses himself yet again in the life of Chekhov, in his writings and his diary, decoding his personal notes and comments ,shaping the famous and enigmatic silence .
Donka, in Russian, signifies the bell attached to a fishing pole which sounds when the fish bite.

According to Wikipedia, Chekhov was an avid angler, having stated that fishing was his chosen way of meditation. The author of the show, fascinated by this imagery and always on the search for “states of enlightenment” in his creative activity, also fishes in this fantasy of the circus in order to bestow life upon a visual poem of bodies and objects in suspension.

An extraordinary cast of international actors, decadent clowns, musicians, dancers and acrobats animate the stage, while the music of Maria Bonzanigo invades the hall, carrying us far off into distant Russia.

We listen to the accordion, to waltzes, ancient romance and traditional choirs, while an entire ensemble of Chekhov’s characters parade within the newly created space: eternal students, doctors, dreamers, bachelors, young girls in mourning. Moments from a lost world succeed one another, accompanied by the chirping of birds, the rustling of wind through the branches, Chinese shadows and explosions of colour . “Perpetual Wonder!”- the artists of the Finzi Pasca Company / not merely boasting / claim on their website.

Enjoying its status as a special guest of the 24th edition of the NTF, “Donka- A letter to Chekhov” is the second to last creation of Daniele Finzi Pasca / already a proeminent figure at the forefront of the international stage and the author of unforgettable shows such as Cirque Éloize and Cirque du Soleil.

Director Daniel Finzi Pasca, on the show: 

“I am a collector of moments, of details, of little tidbits of particular information. My theatre is built of images which juxtapose one another, about which one cannot always talk in a linear fashion. It is a continuous state of illusion, of pretending that something truly happened. I enjoy long silences, pauses, suspended moments, most likely because, for years, I’ve been in pursuit of the natural, of a nonchalant presence on stage.

I’ve decided to uncover Chekhov starting with the details, the particulars of his life, his pages and so on. This is how I’ll tell the story of Chekhov ; for this, I will surround myself with the same accomplices as I always have, creators with whom I’ve collaborated throughout the years and who not only share my aesthetic taste and my way of thinking about theatre but a passion for safe-keeping this imaginary world of ours.

In the show you will see objects suspended in tragic frailty which will slowly melt like ice in the sunlight, like candlewax. There will be precarious balancing acts performed by our actors, there will be clowns, poetic and decadent, though elegantly so. There will be live musicians ,as well as a symphonic orchestra and a marvellous choir.

There will be a lot of white, maybe some blue here and there, little blood stains, hidden like the disease which slowly consumed the writer with bouts of cough. There will be hospital beds like the ones in the countryside ,ravens and other birds, the wind amongst the branches, a child whose chest burns of fever, the sound of a church bell, men hidden beneath bed-sheets, actors denouncing as actors do, probably a fire, a touch of loneliness, a garden, a lake, and a small bell whose cling sounds that a fish finally bit .”

Daniele Finzi Pasca was born into a family of photographers and was basically raised in his father’s darkroom , as were his grand-parents before him.

Daniele is acquainted with the world of theatre through gymnastics, and he later made his first few steps on stage under the guidance of a clown named Fery. In 1983 he left for India, where he worked as a volunteer in a project for aiding terminally ill patients. Upon his return to Switzerland, he foundsed the Sunil Theatre, alongside Maria Bonzanigo and his brother Marco.

From this collaboration a new technique was born, which bears the name Teatro della Carezza (Theatre of the soothing touch).
In 1995, Finzi Pasca was condemned to a short stay in prison following a number of social awareness acts. Within this time, he finishes “Icaro”, an imaginary monologue for a single spectator. Performed by Daniele in six different languages over the past 20 years, “Icaro” has toured the world, having had more than 700 viewings. This show defined the essence of the style and aesthetics for the Teatro Sunil Company.

In the following years, Finzi Pasca would write and direct over 25 shows for the Teatro Sunil.
In 2003, he wrote and directed “Te Amo”, a show produced by Poramor Producciones and Sunil . In 2005 he produced “Coreo” , alongside Cirque du Soleil, (seen by over three million worldwide) and in 2006 he directed the XX Winter Olympics Opening in Turin.
He is the recipient of numerous prestigious awards.

Photo by Viviana Cangialosi

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