There is a theater that isn’t there. And yet, it is there. It is physically there now, but it may not be there later. It’s not a tongue twister, but Niccolò Bracci’s theater, with forty seats between the stalls and the gallery, a theater with its own foyer, stage, wings, and dressing room.
Tiny but intensely powerful. Its creator and builder is Niccolò Bracci, (here is an interview), a man who says he is a farmer and carpenter but is an actor at heart. The theater that isn’t there was born when, after many successes throughout Italy with a theater company of about thirty people, the pandemic arrived. Niccolò decided that he could not fall into what seemed to him to be a trap, so he left behind what he loved most, the theater, and for which he had sacrificed so much.
He was not willing to sell himself short. But the fire of art, as we know, is not easily extinguished, so Niccolò the carpenter decided to create his own stage.
This is how this theatrical gem came into being, existing and yet not existing, on the edge of a forest, with two silent goats as neighbors.
An audience for a select few “repentant” individuals, dedicated to friends and friends of friends. You must introduce yourself to enter this special place that is for everyone, but not really. The theater that isn’t there is Peter Pan’s Neverland, which can be reached by following “the second star to the right, and then straight on till morning.”
Niccolò has a good-natured smile that peeks out from behind his beard and the energy of someone who does everything with conviction. In his words, you can feel his passion for theater, music, and things done well.
“When you act,” he tells us, “you have to be on stage. Outside, you have to be real, even if it’s not easy. I want there to be truth, so what do I do? I pursue critical thinking, or rather, I preserve it so that it is always alive, and those who want and seek a door that isn’t there will find it here. This, then, is theater that isn’t there.”
His thinking is well represented in his latest show, “Maledetti complottisti” (Damned Conspiracy Theorists), an entertaining showcase of some of the many lies that today’s society has fed us and continues to feed us.
From “peace wars” to the moon landing, from September 11 to curfews, and so on.
Niccolò takes to the stage with his “boys” and puts himself out there, showing off and hitting the mark with his weapons of irony and satire, the lightheartedness of music and, in some parts, the charming Tuscan dialect.
So Niccolò, after creating sets, composing and singing, acting and dancing, decided to give a gift to those who understand this island that does not exist, or rather, should not exist, but which lives in the hearts of those who still know how to look at things with the pure eyes of a child and who cry out: “The emperor has no clothes!”
