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Barnard College Department of Theater presents WOMAN OF THE WORLD - Festival of Performance - featuring legendary Italian actress Franca Rame

New York, N.Y., September 8, 2000 -- The Barnard College Department of Theater presents WOMAN OF THE WORLD - Festival of Performance, on September 21-25, in the Minor Latham Playhouse, Broadway at 117th Street.

Festival highlights include a rare visit to New York City by the legendary Italian actress Franca Rame in the NYC premiere performance of Dario Fo's, Sex, Don't Mind If I Do, (Sesso? Si, grazie!), Thursday, September 21, 8 p.m.; and the U.S. premiere appearance of Cuba's cutting-edge theater company, DanzAbierta, featuring Marianela Boan in Blanche on Saturday, September 23, 8 p.m. Completing this trio of extraordinary female solo performers is the world-renowned master performer Sukanya Rahman in a lecture-demonstration, Dance-drama of India, on Monday, September 25, 4:30 p.m. All performances take place at the Minor Latham Playhouse, Broadway & 117th Street.

On Saturday September 23, from 12 - 2 p.m., there will be a symposium of recent graduates of the Barnard-Columbia undergraduate theater program titled "Women of the World (And a Few Men, Too)".

Franca Rame, Sex, Don't Mind If I Do

Franca Rame, a member of one of Italy's most famous theatrical families, has collaborated as a performer and writer with her husband Dario Fo since the early 1950s. Fo, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1997, is the author of Rame's current solo show and an extraordinary comic performer and director in his own right. Together, the two have established a worldwide reputation for their biting satirical plays and performances.

Corruption in the Catholic Church and Italian government, police brutality, abuses in the prison system, violations of human rights, the Mafia, rape, the denial of Italian women's access to divorce and abortion: Fo and Rame have made these dangerous political issues the subject matter of their theater. Drawing on traditions ranging from the commedia dell'arte to puppetry, clowning, storytelling, and the techniques of the great German political playwright and director, Bertolt Brecht, Fo and Rame have subjected virtually every institution, political party, power broker, corrupt organization, and controversial law in Italy to their formidable satirical powers. Over the years, they have been censored, banned, rebuked, denied visas - and played to packed houses all over the world.

Sex? Thanks, Don't Mind if I Do! is Rame's latest contribution to the feminist theater she has begun to explore, create, and perform over the course of the past decade. The September 21st performance at Barnard's Minor Latham Playhouse will mark the show's New York premiere.

Marianela Boan, DanzAbierta, Blanche

Barnard Theater will offer a rare glimpse of cutting-edge Cuban dance/theater, presenting Marianela Boan, founder of Havana's DanzAbierta, in her acclaimed solo piece Blanche, based on A Streetcar Named Desire.

Since the early 80's, Boan has pioneered what she calls "polluted dance", enlisting words, songs, dialogue and even set construction in her movement-based performances. Her company DanzAbierta (OpenDance), has appeared throughout Latin America, Europe and Japan, and Boan has been honored at international festivals as well as at home. She has choreographed extensively for the Cuban National Ballet among other companies, and created dances for films in Cuba, Canada and Spain.

Blanche, Boan's one-woman take on Streetcar, is less a deconstruction than a passionate feat of salvage. Like the classic 50's American cars that still pollute the streets of Havana, their paint jobs supplemented with nail polish, Williams' masterpiece is commandeered to serve the needs of an impoverished people in a peculiar situation. And like those Detroit ghosts, Blanche manages to make desperation seem touching and surprisingly funny. Those who want to know what is happening in Cuba in the post-Elian era will find Blanche deeply informative as well as brilliant.

Ticket Information:

• Tickets for the Sex? Thanks, Don't Mind if I Do!, Rame performance, September 21, are limited and ONLY available at the Minor Latham Playhouse Box Office from 10-11 a.m. and 4-6 p.m., September 15. Reservations will not be accepted. Tickets are $10 for Barnard and Columbia students; $20 for faculty and staff; and $30 for general admission. Ticket purchase will be limited to one per student and two per faculty/general admission.
  
  
• Tickets for Blanche, DanzAbierta performance, September 23, are $5 with CUID and $8 general admission. Reservations can be made by calling 854-5638; tickets must be picked up no later than a half-hour prior to performance. Workshop events are free.
  
  
• Admission for the Rahman's lecture-demonstration, Dance-drama of India, September 25, is free, but reservations are required. Please call 854-5638.

Contact:

Denny Partridge/Katherine Kavanagh, Department of Theater, (212) 854-2080
Petra Tuomi, Public Affairs, 212-854-7907