Milan was cool and junk. I would say that the moral of the trip was: “I’m not sure if this will be ok, but let’s do it anyway.” We visited La Stalla, an opera house with a football field length long stage, and the Piccolo Teatro, that was indeed, ‘Piccolo.’ Ha! We watched our Commedia teacher Michelle Bottini perform in Dario Fo’s new play Storia di Qu: a 3-hour performance in Italian. He was all right (sarcasm for “he was incredible”). Now you may be thinking, “wait a tic, Jordan doesn’t speak Italian. He probably didn’t understand most of what was going on until he talked to Monica during intermission.” Well if you thought this, then you were correct; however, to be fair, the physicality of the performance helped me understand what was going on to some degree. Dario Fo spoke for about 10 minutes at the start of the performance. I had no idea what he said to us, but gosh darn did it seem important! During the tours of these marvelous performance buildings I would sit in the seats and stand on the stages (even though it may have been suggested that we should not), because why not have the fullest experience possible? Let’s do it anyway.

Also that weekend,  a group of friends and I went out to what we thought was an LGBT club. Turns out it was a punk/goth club where we were pretty much the only people there not wearing leather. Seven-foot tall giants, leather roleplaying masks, screamo bands – this place had it all. And it was AWESOME. Moral of the story: we did it anyway and we had a buttin’ great time. So ADA blog reader, take a risk once in a while. It might be worth it (hopefully).

– Jordan Elman

Taking trips with the Accademia always proves to be an adventure, especially when Monica comes with us. This past weekend we went to Milan and got to see what the artistic community is all about. First we got to see our Commedia teacher in a performance, and then we got to tour not one, but two theatres, and see a performance. Milan is one of my favorite cities we have been to and it was incredible to see what is going on culturally in depth, and not just hear about it in a classroom.

Storia di Qu was the show we saw with Michele in it, and despite it all being in Italian, it was still a really enjoyable and I learned a lot by looking at the physicality of the piece. The next day we all got to take a tour of the Piccolo Teatro (where the show was) and see all of the spaces and secret passageways. It was really cool to see that there is absolutely a common language when it comes to theatre, and I didn’t need a translator to understand how a theatre works and what its components are. We then got to go to the La Scala workshop and see all of the inner workings there as well.

Not only did we get to tour La Scala, a few of us actually got to see a performance in the theatre. It was BEAUTIFUL!!! I was able to see the space and I actually sat in my very own box (Probably the classiest I will ever feel in my whole life). The performance was amazing and I could not believe that I was lucky enough to watch it in such an incredible space.

Overall Milan was perfect. We had the best hostel, great experiences, and we all got to share it with eachother. I really love that even though I am in Italy, there are still opportunities for me to experience a common culture of theatre, which is exactly what I came here to do.

– Zoe Briggs