Francischiello - A King Hamlet of Naples at the New Sancarluccio Theater [Review]

Review of the show Franischiello - Un Amleto Re di Napoli, staged by Carmine Borrino to tell the last months of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies

There is something rotten in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. 

One of the best-known quotes from Shakespeare's Hamlet , with the contextualization necessary for the development of the work we want to talk about, well encapsulates the meaning and purpose of the monologue staged by the Neapolitan theatre.

Francischiello – Un Amleto Re di Napoli , a show included in the Tutto il mondo è Palcoscenico festival , dedicated to Shakespeare, was born from an original idea by the actor and director Carmine Borrino who, following an in-depth Shakespearean study, managed to stage a masterly parallel between the last Bourbon king of Naples and Hamlet.

It may seem strange or irrelevant, but if you think about it, the similarities between the English text and the screenplay by the young Neapolitan actor are truly numerous and fascinating.

“I saw the young prince, I spoke to him and the likeness of the king who died overwhelmed me with fear and amazement.
Incredible! The young prince resembles the king who died as I do to myself, and it is true that there are more things in heaven and on earth than I imagine with my imagination! "

Let's start with the basic idea: the desire to create an overlap between the Prince of Denmark and King Francis II of Bourbon, known as Francischiello . Through a compelling and never-boring monologue, Borrino manages to transport us to the crucial months of that summer of 1860, when the fate of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies was about to be decided forever.

Indeed, following the death of his father Ferdinand II, Francischiello will find himself having to face internal and external betrayals , as well as the inevitable annexation-invasion of the Kingdom by the House of Savoy of Piedmont. To narrate this, Borrino uses Shakespeare's text as a guideline, a path along which to guide the story of our Lasagna King.

The narrative begins with the death of King Ferdinand II and the agonizing grief afflicting his son, who is increasingly pressured to assume the reins of the kingdom. This initial parallel with Hamlet gives way to one of the most significant scenes in both works: the appearance of his father's ghost . As in Shakespeare's tragedy, Francischiello will also encounter his father's ghost in the courtyard of the royal palace and will discover the dense web of betrayals he would soon suffer from the men closest to him, just as Hamlet was betrayed by King Claudius, his father's brother, and by extension by his mother, who becomes his wife.

From this moment on, the audience will be confronted with a transformation in the king's personality , who, feigning madness and insanity , will attempt to unravel the true intentions of his Council of State. Thus, a series of despairs and internal conflicts unfold, culminating in that To Be or Not to Be, which not only denotes personal anxiety and indecision, but also the uncertainty of whether to go to war against Piedmont and avoid an invasion.

The parallels, then, continue if we consider Hamlet's feigned madness, revealed in his intense dialogue with Ophelia . This dialogue is also echoed in the play, as King Francis vents his anger with his wife Sophia , even inviting her to "go to a convent" (the same invitation Ophelia received), but emphasizing the importance of her presence at such a crucial moment for the kingdom.

The show ends with a long mention of the heard proclamation that Francischiello wrote in 1860 from Gaeta, a stronghold on the border with the Papal State where he was forced to retreat to fight the English and Piedmontese troops, until there was nothing more to be done.
The scene recited by Borrino was very significant because he represented a fearless king, waving the flag of the Kingdom, intent on defending with all his strength the people and the land that so loved.

A very intense finale, therefore, and not without an attempt to open the eyes of those present: history, Borrino makes us understand, is made by the victors and, in the case of Italian history and that of the South in particular, they have been telling it to us since elementary school without citing the necessary truths.