Anna Mauro author and director
Anna Mauro is an eclectic playwright using a blunt, salacious and irreverent style with a social twist. Her words aim directly to your heart and brain, arousing strong emotions and triggering serious reflexions.
She is a simple, cheerful and charismatic woman - when you talk to her, you immediately perceive her enthusiasm about writing plays and preparing the show she is directing. Her plays provide both humorous and serious or dramatic moments through a free adaptation of her own text, that is to say, she has no obsession for the literal precision of actors.
On the contrary, she focuses on their interpretation of feelings. She praises them much when she feels they are really in the character's shoes. She doesn't like the text to be eclipsed by sheer grandiosity in scenes, costumes or music; her plays are simple like the way she creates them and their poignancy springs from a heart-felt recitation.
Since Anna Mauro is a teacher, her first experiences in drama developed with children and young people. When she was very young herself, she debuted as a promoter, playwright or director in comical shows with a social message featuring friends, colleagues and professionals. Then she successfully started theatre workshops and finally set up an association promoting cultural activities for children, adolescents, adults and elderly people. Now she is working autonomously and her plays are represented throughout Italy and abroad. Her texts are either poetical, humorous or subversive - often skillfully mixing all three attributes. Her approach is based on the research, discovery, and the observation of ordinary people’s life. Her devices in direction aim at carrying the audience away and using irony to relieve, entertain and pacify them.
Her delicate sensitivity in directing actors allows them to express their talent and potential: every night people of all ages work their own stories out to bring their passion - theatre - into life. If the actors enjoy their recitation, the audience will surely be caught in the story. Even if there is a strong commitment on the part of the actors (they question and experiment on their personality making every new performance different in some way), Anna Mauro's plays are peculiar for their "lightness".
A word, a gesture or a nuance of the voice is enough to invent the character a-new. We may consider it a reverse philosophy: it is not people interpreting characters, but rather the characters are given blood and flesh by the actors. Anna Mauro attracts positive energies by spotting hidden talents (now famous) and enhancing individual qualities. Her genius is revealed both in her writing process and her strategies of direction. Her theatre courses for beginners and her indomitable optimism and enthusiasm are her peculiar way to make the theatre a “living” thing.
Simonetta Genova
