What a Tarantula Eats, a production of Teatro Koreja from Italy, presents the audience with small portions of old traditional food of Salento and uses technology to enhance the visual experience. Members tell S Mallik that for them theatre is all about music, food and dance
Ever heard of the Terentella danceIJ It is a group of various folk dances characterised by a fast upbeat tempo, accompanied by tambourines. It is among the most recognised forms of traditional southern Italian music. If history is to be believed, a woman was once bit by a tarantula and she started moving around quickly and, that’s how the name came into being.
However, we are not going to talk about the dance, but a play. It is called What a Tarantula Eats and it is nothing like you would expect in a play. To begin with, this production from Teatro Koreja (pronounced as ‘coreiya’) serves small portions of food to the audience. Georgia Tramacere from the group explained to us that during the performance, the actors engage with the audience and offer them food samples which belonged to the old tradition in Salento, a place in the southern end of Italy. “Theatre for us, is about food tasting, acting and music. We give our audience food of our ancestors which are very rarely found nowadays,” she said and told us what they would be offering the audience to taste during the play. “First there would be dried tomatoes called pomodori secchi followed by scapece gallipolina (a small fish in vinegar) and then we present the lampascioni which is kind of like an onion but is not. The actor demonstrates the right way to savour it by placing it first at the tip of the tongue and then rolling in in the mouth to get a taste of the bitterness. Then we serve the africani or what we call the finger of the Apostles. It is a very simple baked sweet which was once in abundance but now there are only a handful of stores that sell them. We finish it up with vino negroamaro or red wine, which tastes really good after the africani,” Tramacere elaborated.
The story, which runs less than an hour, was conceived in 2004 and was made for an international economic event in Milan. “One of the main aim of the project is to meet people and build a relation between the cultures and food, which is the base of dialogue between two nations,” she said.
What a Tarantula Eats also uses a lot of technology. It is not just equipped with a big screen TV but also requires every member of the audience to wear a headset so that they can hear whatever the actors are saying. “Technology is an easy way to tell something more directly. It enhances the visual experience which is more impactful. The aim is to tell about our land, and technology is the modern language which the younger generation understands. And we wanted to reach out to them,” she pointed out.
If you happen to catch their performance at the Italian Culture Centre today (Italian version at 8pm and English at 9pm) you will be amazed to see the effect they create on the screen. “Its like if the actor goes behind the screen, it will appear that she is acting from behind it but actually it is a pre recorded video. The actors have to be very precise about the coordination,” Tramacare tried to explain the idea.
The entire cast and crew of the group are grateful for the support lent to them by the FSC — Coesion Fopunds, European Union, Puglia Regional Government, Teatro Pubblico Pugliese and also the Instituto Italiano di Cultura in Delhi and Mumbai. “It is because of them that we have been able to bring this show here. We have toured many places with this and it will be a delight to stage it here,” she wrapped up.