The Romeo and Juliet game is a project which refers to a theatre constructed in the social context, in relation to an environment and the community that lives in it. For four months a team of actors, playwrights, scenographers worked with young people of different ethnic backgrounds who attend the literacy schools and centres in the city. They constructed in the centre of Porta Palazzo, at the Albe Steiner school, an inter-ethnic community which produced a spectacular event of great impact for the whole city, from both the artistic and social significance point of view.
The beating heart of Porta Palazzo is the market: the place of ethnic and cultural stratification where goods, flavours, languages from the four corners of the world meet, merge and live together. It is a place of convergence: the culture of exchange is a topos in which each civilisation can recognise itself.
Shakespeare's story served as a pathway to follow another story, that of two ethnic groups or clans struggling for supremacy over the Porta Palazzo market, an ancient affair here set amid the vegetables, fruit, odours and humours of the market.
A large arena, specifically constructed for 500 spectators, 13 professional actors and 40 young people of different ethnic background who together for six days gave life to an event which galvanised the attention of the city, both through the media and through the large public audiences which, for the first time in Turin, were composed of Italians and non-EU citizens, together to watch a story which in some way had something to say about them.
The project, running from February to June 2000, was developed on three levels:
the schools of the city i.e. the stories inspired by Romeo and Juliet.With the coordination of the Grinzane-Cavour Prize, the boys and girls of the city's schools were involved through writing, with the weekly publication of their work on the pages of Torino Sette. The starting point was provided by the archetype defined by the story of Romeo and Juliet.
the Porta Palazzo district, i.e. the theatre work in the workshops.In the area of Porta Palazzo 10 theatre workshops were set up which involved 250 boys and girls aged between eleven and fourteen.The workshops were conducted by professional actors and experts in collaboration with teachers and operators in the above-mentioned centres. The thematics of the project were explored here: through the culture of exchange the different forms of narration and the different physicality of the cultures presented in the "workshop space" were stimulated.
the theatre event, i.e. putting on the show.A small multi-ethnic artistic community of more than seventy persons, comprising actors, boys and girls, youths, directors, playwrights, scenographers, musicians, choreographers, educators all lived through a common experience and participated in the preparations for the theatrical event. Within the group of actors and boys and girls immigrants were present from Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Egypt, Kenya, Morocco, Senegal, Albania, Russia, Brazil, Philippines, Peru.For a month, under the guidance of the project managers and a large artistic and technical team, work went ahead with scene preparation, rehearsals, the construction of scenography and the technical preparation of the space.

The game of Romeo and Juliet went on stage every evening from 17 to 22 June 2000
THE LOCATION of the show: the courtyard of the ALBE STEINER Upper School
THE PUBLIC participating: approx. 4000 persons
Financed by the Turin City Council, Piedmont Region, Turin Province, Fondazione CRT.
Directed by Beppe Rosso
Scenes and Dramaturgy Marcello Chiarenza
Youths directed by: Gianni Bissaca
Lighting: Andrea Violato
Supervision: Remo Rostagno
Music selection: Roberto Marasco
Textual research and co-ord: Marco Alotto
Scene movements: Maria Consagra
Theatre project conceived by Beppe Rosso, Remo Rostagno, Gianni Bissaca

Performed by Teatro dell'Angolo, A.C.T.I. (Ass. Teatro Indipendente), Teatro Stabile di Torino, The Gate, in collaboration with the Premio Grinzane Cavour