Acknowledgements

 

Many years ago, my friend and colleague Karen Bacus, now deceased, brought a brochure into my office that announced Fred Gardaphe, An­thony Tamburri, and Paolo Giordano’s edited collection, From The Margin: Writings in Italian Americana. Knowing of my interest and work in Italian/American studies, Karen encouraged me to contact the editors. I remember the tremendous excitement, enthusiasm, and valida­tion I felt when contacting Fred and Anthony. I wish to thank Fred Gar­daphe and Anthony Tamburri for their vision to give voice to Italian Americans. I thank Jane Campbell for her loving support and editorial advice; Sue Roach for her editorial and computer assistance; William L. Robinson, department head of Communication and Creative Arts and Purdue University Calumet for a research release to complete this proj­ect. And finally, I dedicate this issue to the memory of the late Karen Bacus who unconditionally supported my work while she attempted to understand the tremendous role one’s ethnicity can play in all facets of one’s life.


 

 

Introduction

 

The first time I ever remember seeing any theatrical images that reflected my experience as an Italian American was in Albert In­naurato’s play Gemini. The loud, raucous, brash characters that inhabit this play were very familiar. I remember feeling a twinge of embarrassment as the audience laughed at these characters, though years later I would be thankful and appreciative to have witnessed the implicit cultural values and struggles depicted in Gemini that mark Italian/American drama.

Ironically, the two most well-known American plays depicting Italian/American experience are Tennessee Williams’ Rose Tattoo and Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge. While neither play is written by an Italian/American author, both have been recog­nized as plays that insightfully capture the experience of being from a working class Italian/American background. While Italian Americans might have achieved great success as performers, the absence of their written dramatic voices demonstrates both the politics of the theater world and the struggle facing Italian Ameri­cans who might feel comfortable entertaining groups of people with dramatic stories but uncomfortable alone in a room with a word processor and their own visions of character, dialogue, and plot. While regaling friends and relatives by using those lovely, performative, imaginative oral skills that are a cultural tradition, many Italian Americans appear to prefer being the subject of drama, not its originators.

The politics of an exclusionary theater world that determines whose stories are worthwhile dovetails with a mainstream per­ception that Italian Americans make “good” material either because of their foolishness, their criminal proclivities, or their ability to brazenly speak their minds in a unique, fascinating, and dramatic manner. Why would anyone be interested in Italian Americans exercising dramatic writing skills in an actual play that depicts Italian Americans? Italian Americans are so very visible on television and in films that arguably they do not need any further representation. Yet, these representations are not being challenged enough by Italian/American playwrights who should be allowed to exercise their privileged cultural voice.

At the moment, few Italian/American theater companies exist because theater is a timely and costly business that appeals to a middle- to upper-class clientele who have money to support a particular theater’s endeavors. Hypothetically as Italian Ameri­cans obtain economic and educational success, their visibility in the theater world as dramatists should increase. Supporting the work of Italian/American dramatists may ensure a far more hon­est, realistic, and credible depiction of Italian Americans as op­posed to the abundance of caricatured Italian Americans.

This issue of VIA showcases the work of Italian/American dramatists who either write about Italian/American experience or from an Italian/American sensibility. This collection of plays, play excerpts, and monologues/narratives presents one picture of Ital­ian/American dramatists, celebrating a writing genre often mis­understood and excluded because of the visual and auditory demands it makes on the reader. Deciding to identify as a play­wright often means accepting that one’s work might never have an audience. Production opportunities are limited, and publi­cation opportunities are virtually non-existent. Few Italian Ameri­cans ever have the opportunity to study playwriting and theater since so many come from pragmatic working-class homes where earning an income is of paramount importance, and educating oneself for the fantasy world of theater is not taken seriously.

Yet, while many Italian Americans were not encouraged to be­come playwrights, the value of constructing an interesting and dramatic story that could be performed for visitors (mainly rela­tives) was tantamount to earning one’s license into the culture. My working-class, Italian/American parents saved every last penny to take my sisters and me to a yearly Broadway production. At the age of six, I was completely mesmerized by the theater world—and like so many other Italian Americans discouraged to partake in it. Throughout my young adulthood, I would spend every ounce of my savings to either see productions or read plays. At­tending to the pragmatic cultural values, I became a marketing researcher, until finally, I allowed myself to come out as a play­wright—and embrace my first true love. Through this issue, I wish to acknowledge the cultural tension that exists between valuing performance, drama, and storytelling as a way of life and actually writing or partaking in the theater world as identity and/or voca­tion.

The work in this collection demonstrates quite a range of top­ics, issues, and struggles. In this body of work, I have observed two recurring themes: the plight of being caught between two worlds and two separate sets of values (communal versus indi­vidual) and the outrageous, risk-taking, emotionally challenging humorous voice.

Being caught between the immigrant world and the American world resonates throughout this collection, taking shape as both cultural and class struggles. In Len Fonte’s Wasted Bread, the struggle between culture and class are interwoven in an excruci­ating tale about two aging uncles. The communal Italian cultural values dictate that the uncles will be cared for by family even though one of the uncles, Vinnie, has severe dementia. Frankie, the narrator of this story, immobilized by his allegiance to his family, struggles with the knowledge that his uncle might be bet­ter served in a home care facility. Frankie’s call to action repre­sents a conflict of both cultural and working class values.

Much like Fonte’s play, Anthony Bruno’s performative narra­tives Move Over Caruso and Uncle Natale demonstrate the conflict of culture and class. These humorous yet poignant oral narratives explore working class Italian/American values. Both narratives demonstrate the communal sense of family in a context where re­sources are limited. In Move Over Caruso, the narrator recounts the story of participating in a singing contest with prizes that range from a turkey to a set of pliers. Prompted by his family to partici­pate in this contest, assuming that at the very least, he would win a set of pliers, the narrator painfully learns about a world that ex­ists outside of his own working-class, Italian/American family. Uncle Natale examines the value of family loyalty even when a family member behaves inappropriately.

For Maria Ungaro, a character in Paola Corso’s Flash Light, be­ing caught is a literal and spiritual experience. Based on an oral history, Corso artfully weaves several poetic narratives that re­semble the fabric wasps’ nest woven by Maria, who has recently emigrated from Italy, and struggles with the American value of individualism reflected by her neighbors’ unwillingness to build a communal area for people to gather and socialize or to see the beauty in the wasps’ nest. At the end of the play, a strong bright light of psychological and spiritual significance appears as the audience is left to imagine Maria’s future in America.

In John Gronbeck-Tedesco’s Tony and the Telephone Pole, the main characters, Tony and Maureen, a married couple who are children of Italian immigrants fight an American culture that has stripped them of their identity and values, providing a contrast to images of Italians and Italian Americans who accept their immi­grant plight as victimization. When their phone, a staple of their fruit stand business, is disconnected because of overdue charges, Maureen and Tony chop down the telephone pole in a comedic and retaliatory act. This seemingly illogical act expresses an immi­grant frustration with an American rules system that lacks com­passion and consideration for its citizens.

John Primavera’s Wild Oats illustrates the collision between gay identity and heterosexual, Italian/American values through the relationship between Buddy and Hal, business partners who be­come lovers in the 1950s. While the play revolves around the de­veloping relationship between Buddy and Hal, Buddy’s mother and sister become distraught when confronted with a world that conflicts with their values. Managing an Italian/American and a gay identity is akin to managing an Italian and American identity; both worlds are in sharp contrast with one another, and survival might depend on choosing one identity over the other.

John Capecci, in contrast, creates a world where both gay and Italian/American identities survive through commonalties. In By Design, Capecci presents us with Jerry, who tells a humorous yet enlightening story of preparing a store’s window display only to be complimented by the store owner for being “so good at that.” Jerry is left to muse over whether the store owner intends to com­pliment him for his gay or for his Italian/American identity. To Jerry, both identities share similar values—a sharp sense of aes­thetics and sensitivity to audience. In Two Worlds, Capecci unites both identities by using food, which symbolizes the lively en­gagement of being both Italian/American and gay, as a form of seduction.

The outrageous, risk-taking voice appears in Serena Anderlini-D’Onofrio’s adaptation of a Fo/Rame story, An Open Couple . . . Wilde Open. This play pokes fun at heterosexual relationships through a spirited yet dangerous game where Antonia reveals to her unfaithful husband her own involvement with a transsexual. By discussing the creation of a hand-tailored penis, challenging both heterosexual and homosexual sexual dynamics, Anderlini-D’Onofrio calls into question the nature and value of intimate re­lationships. The monologues invite the audience to participate in the play’s game.

 Like An Open Couple . . ., Chris Cinque’s The Scrub, an explora­tion of a mother/daughter relationship, utilizes the outrageous, risk-taking voice, escorting the audience on a foray into a world where identity is malleable. By taking on a variety of identities and play acting them out in front of the audience, Cinque shows how being or feeling different is a form of exile. This poetic trans­formation from one identity to the next in an effort to obtain ac­ceptance and approval from her mother mandates a close exami­nation of how one’s self shatters without a foundation.

Mario Fratti’s Confessions brazenly confronts the hypocrisy of the Catholic church by presenting a confession between a con­fused and vulnerable woman and a voyeuristic priest. Fratti dares to confront this topic by playing with the tension between religion and sexuality, presenting the combat between repression and de­sire. Desire, even in the most repressed situation like that imposed by the confessional, proves to be the stronger emotion.

Acute awareness of audience emerges as a consistent element throughout this collection by way of direct address to the audi­ence, a convention not seen in all theatrical works. In many of these plays, the writer chooses to speak directly to the audience as if to garner support from them, once again reflecting the commu­nal nature of the Italian/American voice. The current trend to­ward post modern performance art in which performers express their theoretical insights and emotional needs, regardless of an audience’s presence, demonstrates a distinct difference between Italian/American ethnic voice and American voice.

This collection opens with Blossom Kirschenbaum’s essay, which salutes the accomplishments of playwright Joseph Pintauro, yet deconstructs his Italian/American and gay identities. For ex­ample, in reference to his plays Cacciatore which presents Italian/ American characters and Snow Orchid which does not present Italian/American characters, Kirschenbaum quotes Pintauro as saying, “I wrote Cacciatore as an Italian American, but not Snow Orchid.” Such a statement, whether spoken by Pintauro or filtered through Kirschenbaum’s perception, dismisses the notion that one’s ethnic sensibilities are implicit in all of one’s art—as though one could turn off ethnicity as if it were a bad habit. This state­ment is further corroborated by Kirschenbaum’s observation, “For Pintauro, now, Italian identity implies greater closeness to the Greeks.” Such an observation hovers between a celebration of rich Italian history and flagrant dismissal of Italian identity. Kirschen­baum’s deconstruction continues while referring to Pintauro’s gay novel, Cold Hands.

Interpreting Russell Banks’s praise for this work, Kirschen­baum writes, “. . . Cold Hands (like Carson McCullers’s The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter or James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room) resonates be­yond the ‘gay novel’s’ implied strictures.” In an effort to cast Pin­tauro as a major American literary force of the twentieth century, at times the essay appears to diminish those components of Pin­tauro’s identity which have added depth to his work.

In this issue of VIA, each play attempts to capture some com­ponent of Italian/American ethnicity that reverberates within a context of multiple identities. Through this collection, I offer an Italian/American theatrical voice that pleases, challenges, and confronts many of the issues still facing this lively, formidable, resilient ethnicity. In a 1978 New York Times interview with jour­nalist Elizabeth Stone, playwright Albert Innaurato described his family’s communication style as being “right out there.”

My greatest hope is that Innaurato’s accurate description of Italian/American communication will be captured in this body of work.

 

Theresa Carilli

Purdue University Calumet