Lehman March 2

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Milan - Lehman Trilogy

1. Luca Ronconi’s Lehman Trilogy: Staging the Downfall of a Financial Giant

   Feb 28, 2015 | The Guardian (UK)

   By Brigitte Salino
   
   
   One thing stands out in Italian theatres: the audiences are really responsive. If they think an actor is very good, they are quick to applaud. If they dislike a player, they will make it quite clear at the curtain call. Authors and directors are treated the same way. They may be greeted with a steady stream of boos or cheers when they appear on stage.

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Client Attorney Privileged/Attorney Work Product/At Request of Counsel

Milan - Lehman Trilogy

1. Luca Ronconi’s Lehman Trilogy: Staging the Downfall of a Financial Giant

   Feb 28, 2015 | The Guardian (UK)

   By Brigitte Salino

   One thing stands out in Italian theatres: the audiences are really responsive. If they think an actor is very good, they are quick to applaud. If they dislike a player, they will make it quite clear at the curtain call. Authors and directors are treated the same way. They may be greeted with a steady stream of boos or cheers when they appear on stage. It may be cruel but it’s lively. Elsewhere when a production is a flop, or viewed as such, it generally prompts polite applause, but no more. Shouting is unusual, fighting even more so. There was neither shouting nor fighting in Milan for the first night of Lehman Trilogy, a play by Stefano Massini directed by Luca Ronconi at the Piccolo Teatro. But the response of the audience, which included some of the city’s keenest theatre-goers, was a mixture of enthusiasm and disgust.

   It was certainly a unique occasion. To see his play directed by one of Europe’s last dramatic maestros was a real treat for the Florentine dramatist aged only 39. The triumphant world premiere was in Paris, two years ago, directed by Arnaud Meunier. Here in Italy the Piccolo is the first to stage the drama. It is all the more intriguing that Ronconi, the theatre’s artistic director, should have chosen Lehman Trilogy, because these days he generally avoids contemporary works. So there must be something exceptional in Massini’s lines for him to accept the challenge. The five-hour saga proves he was right. This is a story that should concern everyone, the tale of three Jewish brothers who migrated from Germany to the United States in the mid-19th century and became the kings of Wall Street. Then one day in 2008, in the turmoil stirred up by the sub-prime crash, Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy.

   Writing the play involved three years’ detailed research in finance, economics and more. Massini already knew about Jewish culture, which is essential in Lehman Trilogy. As a child, his Roman Catholic parents let him attend both a conventional Italian school and a Jewish academy. So he grew up between church and synagogue and speaks not only Hebrew and Italian, but also English and Arabic. He can even decipher hieroglyphs, a skill he picked up while studying archaeology, though he took it no further. Having dabbled in amateur dramatics since school, he leapt at the chance to work in the theatre. While he was working as Ronconi’s assistant, the director encouraged him to start writing, fulfilling a childhood dream.

   Several plays followed, inspired by Vincent van Gogh, Franz Kafka, Anna Politkovskaya, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or indeed the trial of God conducted by Jews at Auschwitz (Processo a Dio), among others. The Lehman brothers saga fired Massini’s imagination because it is a story of our time and thus has the potential to become a myth. It starts at 7.25am on 11 September 1844, when Heyum Lehmann, the son of a cattle merchant from Rimpur, Bavaria, landed at the port of New York, instantly becoming Henry Lehman, because an immigration officer misspelt his name. His rebirth set in motion a story that ended in 1984 when American Express took over the bank. Members of the family had long given up control of the company. Bobbie, the last in the long line, died without an heir in 1969, aged 77. The play passes over subsequent events swiftly, concentrating on the irresistible rise of two men, Pete Peterson and Lewis Glucksman, at a time when finance was becoming increasingly speculative.

   It may seem surprising that the playwright did not continue his narrative up to the 2008 bankruptcy, but he wanted to focus on the three generations of the Lehman family whose empire, patiently built over 140 years, collapsed in so short a time, symptomatic of the modern world in which new can turn old overnight. The sudden downfall puts a disarming end to the saga that Ronconi chose to stage in the historic walls of the Piccolo. So many memories haunt this tiny theatre, which seats just 488. It was here, on 14 May 1947, that Giorgio Strehler and Paolo Grassi started the first permanent theatre in postwar Italy. Advertisement

   The curtain rises on a white room, with stylised tables and chairs. The set of Lehman Trilogy is like a window on the past, the time stuck at 7.25am. Henry Lehman, who preceded his two brothers, is already middle-aged, wearing a black suit, a cravat and a spotless shirt. His cloak is also black, cut in elegant Italian style. Much as the clock, this garment, which is worn by almost all the Lehmans, is a reminder of conditions at the start of the story.

   Work was an austere religion; each task had to be completed in accordance with strict rules, in order to earn money. It starts in a shop in Montgomery, Alabama, where Henry, soon joined by his younger brothers Mayer and Emanuel, sold cloth. Thirty years later their exceptional business acumen led them to found a bank in New York, but without Henry, who had died of yellow fever...

   For full story:

   http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2015/feb/28/ronconi-lehman-trilogy-play-theatre
   

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