Gianni Manzella on Saint Joan of the Stockyards, “il manifesto”, May 4 2024

Joan rock and dark, the damsel by Brecht
Gianni Manzella, “il manifesto”, May 4th 2024
https://ilmanifesto.it/giovanna-rock-e-dark-la-pulzella-di-brecht

“Reversing the famous Faustian image, one could define Joan Dark, the maiden of the Chicago Slaughterhouses in Bertolt Brecht’s play, as a part of that force that eternally desires goodness and eternally accomplishes evil. Or out of paradox, another ‘good soul’, with an excess of naivety in her tragicomic quest for goodness at any cost for a working class to be saved by faith. There is, moreover, something dark in her name, and it is reflected in the severe militaristic uniform she appears in in the performance by Davide Sacco and Agata Tomšič, the two creators of ErosAntEros, who conceive, direct and stage this Saint Joan of the Stockyards. […] That offered by ErosAntEros obviously does not disregard the seductive bond between the two protagonists (Danilo Nigrelli and Agata Tomšič). The demonic capitalist in crisis of conscience also experiences a dissociation parallel to her own, in the unfeigned grief before the slain animals that he instinctively surrenders to the law of money, the only religion to which he bows. Rather, ErosAntEros seems to withdraw from dialectical comedy to accentuate the militant dimension, recalling the theme of class struggle within the drama. Thus Joan’s martyrdom takes the form of a ritual.”