Within the international cooperation project between BIPAF Busan International Performing Arts Festival and Fabbrica Europa
Chair/IL POSTO is an international co-production emerged from the CRISOL – creative processes project, coordinated by Fabbrica Europa. The project began with auditions in Italy, where four young Italian performers – Alessandra Cozzi, Lara Di Bello, Giorgia F. Fiorentini, Luca Maino – were chosen from several hundreds of applicants. These selected artists then spent about a month in Japan, working closely with director Takahiro Fujita, founder of the mum & gypsy company, to create the piece, Japanese performers Aoi Nakasone, on stage, and Izumi Aoyagi, on video.
The work draws inspiration from Fujita’s experiences during his stay in Sansepolcro, Tuscany, in November 2023. It weaves together a tapestry of scenes, places, and events observed by Fujita, incorporating interviews with the cast, Italian fairy tales and actual incidents and tragic events.
A unique aspect of Chair/IL POSTO is its bilingual nature, with performers seamlessly transitioning between their native Italian and Japanese throughout the narrative. This linguistic interplay adds depth to the storytelling, as characters navigate ordinary conversations and daily life in the town while gradually uncovering and confronting real-life incidents and tragedies.
mum & gypsy is a Japanese theatre company founded in 2007 by playwright and director Takahiro Fujita. In 2011, at the age of 26, Fujita was the youngest winner of the Kishida Kunio Drama Award, one of the most important prizes in the Japanese theatre scene and today is considered one of Japan’s most important playwrights and directors.
With mum & gypsy he directed more than 50 productions, involving an audience of over 25,000 spectators. He has collaborated with public theaters such as the Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre and the Saitama Arts Theatre. One of his best-known works – awarded with the Yomiuri Theater Awards – is the stage adaptation of “Cocoon” by manga artist Machiko Kyo. In 2013 he collaborated with internationally renowned writer Mieko Kawakami, with a work performed in 18 cities in Japan. As a playwright he adapted Haruki Murakami’s novel The Wind Up Bird Chronicle (international bestseller with 2.2 million copies sold and translated into 24 languages) for a work by the Israeli choreographer and director Inbal Pinto.
Chair/IL POSTO represents a significant milestone for mum & gypsy, marking their second multilingual work and showcasing Fujita’s continued exploration of cross-cultural collaboration in theatre.
playwright and direction: Takahiro Fujita
performers: Alessandra Cozzi, Lara di Bello, Giorgia Fagotto Fiorentini Luca Maino, Aoi Nakasone, Izumi Aoyagi (video only)
stage manager: Yoshiko Haraguchi
lighting: Kaori Minami
sound: Daisuke Hoshino, Nobu Ikeda
video: Jitsuko Mesuda
subtitle operator: Shiori Koga
tour manager: Miwa Monden
producers: Kana Hayashi, Marta Meroni
costume: Sachiko Wakabayashi
a Fabbrica Europa, CapoTrave/Kilowatt and mum & gypsy co-production within the CRISOL – creative processes, financed under the Boarding Pass Plus 2022/2023/2024 programme of the Italian Ministry of Culture
photo: igaki photo studio, courtesy: Toyooka Theater Festival
