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| Strehler's Piccolo Teatro | |
|---|---|
| Name | Piccolo Teatro (Strehler era) |
| Caption | Piccolo Teatro di Milano, Teatro Grassi and Teatro Strehler |
| Address | Via Rovello, Milan |
| City | Milan |
| Country | Italy |
| Architect | Azzurro orignal (Ermanno Strehler era influence) |
| Opened | 1947 (Piccolo Teatro foundation) |
| Owner | Comune di Milano |
| Type | Public theatre |
Strehler's Piccolo Teatro
Strehler's Piccolo Teatro is the period of leadership around Ermanno Strehler at the Piccolo Teatro di Milano, a defining epoch in postwar Italian theatre that connected Milanese cultural institutions and European dramatic movements. The era linked Italian directors, playwrights, actors, and designers across venues in Milan, Turin, Rome, Venice, and international festivals, shaping repertory practice and ensemble formation. It became a nexus for collaboration among figures from the Commedia dell'Arte tradition to modernist auteurs and for exchanges with opera houses, conservatories, and film studios.
The historical arc intersects with the aftermath of World War II, the Italian Republic, and the reconstruction of cultural life in Milan, Italy, and Europe. Early connections tied the Piccolo to institutions such as the Teatro alla Scala, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, La Fenice, Teatro dell'Opera di Roma, and the municipal administrations of Turin and Venice. Internationally, tours and exchanges involved the Comédie-Française, Royal Shakespeare Company, Deutsches Schauspielhaus, Burgtheater, Théâtre National Populaire, and festivals like the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Avignon Festival, Salzburg Festival, and Berliner Festspiele.
Ermanno Strehler articulated a civic model that linked repertory practice to public access, aligning the Piccolo with patrons such as the Comune di Milano, funders like the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism (Italy), and networks including the European Theatre Convention and UNESCO. Strehler's vision drew on precedents from Guthrie Theater, Maly Theatre, Comédie-Italienne frameworks, and pedagogical links with the Conservatorio di Milano, Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia, and the Società Umanitaria. He emphasized actor training connected to methods attributed to Konstantin Stanislavski, Bertolt Brecht, Vsevolod Meyerhold, Jacques Copeau, and Antoine Vitez, while engaging playwrights like Luigi Pirandello, Eugène Ionesco, Samuel Beckett, Bertolt Brecht (playwright), and Dario Fo.
The Piccolo's physical footprint involved adaptive reuse and collaborations with architects and designers who worked across Italian theatres such as Teatro alla Scala restorations, and municipal projects in Milan with firms connected to Giuseppe Terragni influences and modernists like Adalberto Libera and Gio Ponti. Performance spaces included the original venue in Via Rovello, the Teatro Grassi, and seasonal use of spaces associated with Palazzo Marino, Castello Sforzesco courtyards, and touring stages at the Teatro Romano (Verona). Technical and scenographic partnerships engaged designers linked to Gae Aulenti, Luca Ronconi, Sergio Tranchina, Danilo Donati, and lighting practices shared with Sofia Gubaidulina collaborators and opera workshop teams from Ennio Morricone ensembles.
Repertoire under Strehler balanced classical texts and contemporary commissions, staging works by William Shakespeare, Molière, Federico García Lorca, Tennessee Williams, Anton Chekhov, Eugene O'Neill, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Jean Racine, Henrik Ibsen, and modernists such as Bertolt Brecht, Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, Arthur Miller, and Dario Fo. The artistic direction fostered ensemble practice similar to the Abbey Theatre model, with long-term actors trained in methods associated with Lee Strasberg, Michel Saint-Denis, and Yevgeny Vakhtangov. Collaborations extended to playwrights and translators affiliated with publishing houses like Einaudi, Feltrinelli, Mondadori, and theatre periodicals including Sipario and Il Giornale della Musica.
Major productions from the era included stagings that toured to the Royal National Theatre, Comédie-Française, Schauspielhaus Zürich, Kammerspiele München, and venues in New York City such as Lincoln Center and the Juilliard School exchanges. Key collaborators included directors and designers from the circuits of Giorgio Strehler's contemporaries, actors connected to Anna Proclemer, Paolo Poli, Giulio Bosetti, and international guests from Peter Brook, Ellen Stewart (La MaMa), Jerzy Grotowski, Tadeusz Kantor, and choreographers associated with Pina Bausch and Maurice Béjart. Musical partnerships involved composers and conductors like Carlo Maria Giulini, Riccardo Muti, Claudio Abbado, and contemporary ensembles such as La Scala Philharmonic Orchestra.
The Strehler-era Piccolo influenced postwar European theatre policy, repertory systems, and actor training across institutions like the National Theatre (Prague), Svenska Teatern, Dai Theatre (Japan), and conservatories in Paris, London, Berlin, and New York City. Its model informed festival programming at Cannes Film Festival side-programmes, theatrical research at SOAS, University of Milan, and interdisciplinary projects with the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera. The era left archival traces in collections at the Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense, Archivio di Stato di Milano, and documentation networks of the International Federation for Theatre Research.
Acknowledgement came through civic awards from the Comune di Milano, national honors from the President of the Italian Republic, international prizes like the Europe Theatre Prize, and festival acknowledgments at Avignon Festival and Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Individual collaborators received accolades from institutions including the Accademia dei Lincei, the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, and honorary degrees from universities such as University of Milan, Sapienza University of Rome, and University of Oxford.