The Farce of Dario Fo
'The Accidental Death of an Anarchist' is about the police in Italy and they how treat people differently due to who they are and what they believe. The play starts off with a back story of a bomb going off at a railway station and the only anarchist was the suspect. After interrogation the anarchist committed suicide in the police station by jumping out of a window. The play begins in a police station with a character called Maniac who is convicted of impersonation. After this, he gets out and pretends to be a judge, and the play then develops from here.
Death is a major theme in this play, because they keep bringing up the fact the way the anarchist died – did he commit suicide or was he murdered by the police? This is very important because it links to the theme of justice as well, but it also illustrates how a small action can have a huge consequence, which also links to the theme of being deceitful. In this play, the police were constantly untruthful about what had happened on the night of the death, but because of the Maniac being artful, they began to get themselves into more trouble than before. Therefore Fo is trying to portray that lying does not get you away from the truth and justice is again showed throughout the play.
From this play, it has a big message written all over it, however what Fo is trying to say about the police is that even though they may have a bit more authority than the rest of the people, it does not give them the right to convict people whom they may not like due to what they believe in or even their status in society. As a result, society has been shown as vulnerable and the corruption of Italy at that time makes things worse.
The reason why Fo has been able to make a comment with such a small cast is because I think that he didn't want to focus on the cast itself but mainly the message the play is going to provide. Therefore by getting a small cast it reduced the audiences’ attention from the cast, as he believes it is not as important as the comment given out. Fo even makes a joke about the cast being very small - ‘Maniac: Remind me not to appear in these cheap touring productions again. Can’t even afford a decent- sized cast’.
The Maniac, I believe is one of the most important characters in the play. This is due to the fact that the Maniac plays an imperative role in being Fo’s voice and doing and saying what Fo would want to happen. Also Maniac is a rounded character, so there are many sides to him. The Maniac’s role in the play it to uncover secretes in the play and shows what should be right. I believe that Maniac is quite tactical in his ways to get Fo’s views across and to show the truth to the audience. For example, when he was pretending to be the judge and ‘helping’ the Superintendent and Pissani to write another transcript, he ended up getting the Superintendent and Pissani into more trouble than before which then unravelled the truth.
As this is a comedic play, farce is presented throughout it for the entertainment for the audience. For instance, when they were just about to begin writing another transcript, ‘Maniac: And then we began to sing…Having created such a cosy atmosphere what else would you do but engage yourselves in a four-part harmony?’ This is farce as the Maniac is being deliberately absurd by suggesting that they sang after interrogation. This is effective, because it gets the audience to laugh at the ludicrousness of this.
Satire it conveyed throughout to get a strong and powerful message to the audience. For example, when Maniac was in room filled all the files of the people who were convicted; he threw out the files that belonged to the ‘small people’ out of the window, as they were convicted of small crimes and shouldn't be punished. This is satire because although it was very humorous at the time, but what Fo was giving justice to these people. The reason why Fo did this was to show the corruption of Italy at that time which included the government officials and the police. This was effective, because back then the Italian audience understood this as well as the comical side to it because they were living in this situation.
Death is a major theme in this play, because they keep bringing up the fact the way the anarchist died – did he commit suicide or was he murdered by the police? This is very important because it links to the theme of justice as well, but it also illustrates how a small action can have a huge consequence, which also links to the theme of being deceitful. In this play, the police were constantly untruthful about what had happened on the night of the death, but because of the Maniac being artful, they began to get themselves into more trouble than before. Therefore Fo is trying to portray that lying does not get you away from the truth and justice is again showed throughout the play.
From this play, it has a big message written all over it, however what Fo is trying to say about the police is that even though they may have a bit more authority than the rest of the people, it does not give them the right to convict people whom they may not like due to what they believe in or even their status in society. As a result, society has been shown as vulnerable and the corruption of Italy at that time makes things worse.
The reason why Fo has been able to make a comment with such a small cast is because I think that he didn't want to focus on the cast itself but mainly the message the play is going to provide. Therefore by getting a small cast it reduced the audiences’ attention from the cast, as he believes it is not as important as the comment given out. Fo even makes a joke about the cast being very small - ‘Maniac: Remind me not to appear in these cheap touring productions again. Can’t even afford a decent- sized cast’.
The Maniac, I believe is one of the most important characters in the play. This is due to the fact that the Maniac plays an imperative role in being Fo’s voice and doing and saying what Fo would want to happen. Also Maniac is a rounded character, so there are many sides to him. The Maniac’s role in the play it to uncover secretes in the play and shows what should be right. I believe that Maniac is quite tactical in his ways to get Fo’s views across and to show the truth to the audience. For example, when he was pretending to be the judge and ‘helping’ the Superintendent and Pissani to write another transcript, he ended up getting the Superintendent and Pissani into more trouble than before which then unravelled the truth.
As this is a comedic play, farce is presented throughout it for the entertainment for the audience. For instance, when they were just about to begin writing another transcript, ‘Maniac: And then we began to sing…Having created such a cosy atmosphere what else would you do but engage yourselves in a four-part harmony?’ This is farce as the Maniac is being deliberately absurd by suggesting that they sang after interrogation. This is effective, because it gets the audience to laugh at the ludicrousness of this.
Satire it conveyed throughout to get a strong and powerful message to the audience. For example, when Maniac was in room filled all the files of the people who were convicted; he threw out the files that belonged to the ‘small people’ out of the window, as they were convicted of small crimes and shouldn't be punished. This is satire because although it was very humorous at the time, but what Fo was giving justice to these people. The reason why Fo did this was to show the corruption of Italy at that time which included the government officials and the police. This was effective, because back then the Italian audience understood this as well as the comical side to it because they were living in this situation.