São Paulo – One of the stories taken from the book One Thousand and One Nights will be the theme of a play that will open at Sesc Pompeia, in the city of São Paulo, between February 28th and April 19th. Sinbad, the Sailor, play produced by theater company Cia. Circo Mínimo, was adapted from the translation of the classic done by the Brazilian translator Mamed Jarouche, professor at University of São Paulo (USP).
In the adaptation by Cia. Circo Mínimo, the main characters are two clowns. They’re the ones to narrate what happened to Sinbad, a porter that couldn’t handle the hardships of his penniless life. In front of a mansion, in Baghdad, he meets his namesake, who shows him that he conquered his wealth through hard work, sailing throughout the seas.
The book One Thousand and One Nights brings stories told by Scheherazade during 1,001 nights. After being betrayed by his wife, the king decides to marry a new woman every day, only to kill his new wife by morning. To escape death, Scheherazade engages the king with a different story every night until she is able to earn his love once and for all.
At Sesc Pompeia, actors Rodrigo Matheus and Ronaldo Aguiar play the clowns that talk about Sinbad. Both clowns want the role of the sailor, so they’re always fighting because one of them always end up with secondary characters, such as the serpent, the captain or the giant. “They are both storytellers, just like Sinbad and Scheherazade”, says Rodrigo. In the play, bamboos are used in the scenes and also become images, a boat or other structures used by the clowns to go up or down.
Rodrigo, who is the founder of the theater company, tells that the idea for staging the Sinbad story was given to him by a friend of the group, the writer Milton Hatoum. Last year, the actor presented a workshop about bamboo works and, thus, the group decided to mix both things, bamboos and the idea, and produce the play. Rehearsals were conducted in the second semester of last year. After Sesc Pompeia, the group plans to present the play in other Brazilian cities.
One part of the Sinbad story’s theater adaptation was done by Rodrigo and Alexandre Roit, a collaborator of the group. The other part (the major part, according to Rodrigo) was done during rehearsals, led by the play’s director, Carla Candiotto. The Cia. Circo Mínimo bases its work on the integration of theatrical language with elements from the circus.
*Translated by Sérgio Kakitani
