Don Raffaele il Trombone e Cupido Scherza e Spazza

SILVIO ORLANDO    ENZO CANNAVALE

in

DON RAFFAELE IL TROMBONE

And

CUPIDO SCHERZA E SPAZZA

due farse by PEPPINO DE FILIPPO

with

GIOVANNI ESPOSITO

FULVIO FALZARANO

MIMMA LOVOI

RICCARDO ZINNA

MARIA LAURA RONDANINI

BRUNO CARIELLO

CARLO SALZANO

set design

SASÀ GIUSTO

costumes

ANNALISA GIACCI

music

ENZO GRAGNANIELLO

lighting design

CESARE ACCETTA

directed by

SILVIO ORLANDO

The show premiered at the Teatro delle Rose in Piano di Sorrento (NA) on 31 July 1998. Among the greatest stage successes of the De Filippo siblings' company were two one-act plays written by Peppino, Don Raffaele il trombone and Cupido scherza e spazza, which premiered at the Kursaal in Naples (later the Cinema Filangieri) in 1931, the same year the Teatro Umoristico I De Filippo was founded.

Don Raffaele il trombone is the story of a luckless musician who, despite the hunger and poverty hanging over his family, cherishes dreams of glory, composing endless operas that presumably no one will ever perform. But one fine day fortune seems to knock at his door: a rich, elegant gentleman, also a music master, turns up at his home and offers Don Raffaele a long tour abroad.

After consulting his family, the hungry musician decides to ask for an advance of 10,000 lire, which the maestro hands over without batting an eyelid. But Don Raffaele's joy is short-lived: after carefully putting the money away in a box, he is told that the elegant gentleman is not a music master at all, but a madman who hands out counterfeit money.

“Cupido scherza e spazza” is instead the story of a street sweeper, Vincenzo Esposito, whose wife is cheating on him with the sweepers' foreman. As chance would have it, a suitor of Rosina, the Espositos' niece, takes revenge for being rejected by telling Vincenzo that his wife is carrying on with Pascottella (the foreman). Vincenzo decides to confront the foreman, but in the middle of the argument one of the foreman's creditors arrives, decides to teach him a lesson for an unpaid debt, and runs off.

So Vincenzo, who would like to help his superior, sees his family arriving, runs to fetch a hammer and, with a swaggering air, pretends to hit him. Articles. Photographs are free of publication rights for press use. Please always credit the photographer.

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