The ancient biblical story of Judith Slaying Holofernes performed by the NYU Commedia dell’Arte Students. This biblical story is presented with large scale puppets, songs in Xhosa & Zulu and told in 5 languages. This imagistic story, celebrated in the paintings of Caravaggio and Artemisia Gentileschi, unfolds in a vibrant procession of beauty, violence, seduction and revenge.
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NYU Commedia dell'Arte
Cast
For fourteen years, Jim Calder has brought undergraduate students to NYU’s Florence campus to study Commedia dell’Arte. In the last few years, the program has blossomed tremendously with the incorporation of Master Teacher Jacob Olesen and Music Director Nolufefe Mtshabe, and the support of Ellyn Toscano and the entire staff at La Pietra. The Commedia dell’Arte workshop at La Pietra is an exciting and rigorous program that teaches drama students, through the vehicle of the very forward Commedia stock characters, what it feels like to really believe in something, to want something, and to go after it. Students take class with Jim and Jacob, working through various physical exercises and Commedia lazzi, make large scale puppets and props with visual artist Joan Harmon, and learn music in Xhosa and Zulu with award winning Choir Director Nolufefe Mtshabe.