The parish theater at N.S. di Coromoto in Rome, February 11, 1998. The stage belongs to "A Play Without Actors"—performed by the disabled young people of "Gruppo Amici," directed by Maria Antonietta Pieroni and her colleagues.
The small hall is packed. Relatives and friends continue to arrive, smiling and eager. The young actors move restlessly backstage, peeking out from behind the red curtain, trembling with excitement. The air crackles with anticipation. Then it begins. An elegant young man takes the stage as presenter and introduces each performer in turn. Some sing, some recite poetry, some play instruments. One boy delivers the entire long poem by Totò, "La livella," by heart. Fabrizio sits at the piano and plays current hit songs with confidence. Another sings opera with passion. There is a girl who recites a short poem, a boy on accordion, someone singing an old Roman folk song that the audience joins in on, and then—a voice that moves us all, singing with such longing: "Mamma son tanto felice…!"
What emerges is something like a school recital, an end-of-year academy show. The initial joy in the audience gradually gives way to silence, to attention, to tears, to reflection. "These young people—they're so talented. Some of them work so hard just to do what they're doing. And the passion! The real joy in their faces…"
Mrs. Pieroni, together with Michela Borghese, who accompanies on piano, is always present on stage. She gives cues, offers prompts, joins in the singing, steadying voices that seem to come from deep wells of quietness, from thick layers of silence. Sometimes she seems almost to pull the sound up and out of them. At other moments, with a gesture, she tempers a note that's too sharp, a voice that's straying.
The young people alternating on stage carry significant disabilities. You hear whispered comments from people in the audience who know them: "Is that really her? She barely speaks to us, but here she's reciting…" "That's him? He's so shy he hardly talks—but listen to him sing, perfectly on pitch…" "I had no idea he could play piano like that…"
Then it ends. Riccardo, with a warm, strong voice, sings: "Penso che un giorno così non ritorni mai più." His small chorus of friends joins him: "Volare, oh! oh!" A fitting finale. Today these young people have soared above their struggles and shown us what they can do and who they are. They've revealed gifts we didn't know they had—their hunger to entertain us, to be seen, to be applauded.
We believe a day like this should come again.
This too is theater. Important theater.
- M.T.M., 1998