Il sindaco del Rione Sanità by Mario Martone - The Rehearsals

Five young Neapolitan filmmakers film the preparation and staging of “Il Sindaco” at the NEST theater in San Giovanni a Teduccio, in the southern outskirts of Naples. San Giovanni is a harsh neighborhood, more densely populated than Tokyo, NEST is a very active civil space, also born from the initiative of those who are now on stage. The direction is by Mario Martone, at his first meeting with De Filippo, and it is also the first time of a setting in the Neapolitan present.
The medium-length film features the actors and the director of Il Sindaco del rione Sanità. The NEST theater, the entire district of San Giovanni a Teduccio and Naples move around them. Outside and inside the theatrical fiction, the actors are characters in the film, primarily characterized by their role in the play, but also by their memories of the places and how they cross them. Mario Martone at work is side by side with the actors and his place is the stage. The understanding of the text, the construction of psychologies and the daily search for scenic actions are the spaces of the director-character of the film. The neighborhood for short paintings and meetings and the city as a distant spirit are the other protagonists.