ROCCO UND SEINE BRÜDER Based on the film »Rocco e i suoi fratelli« by Luchino Visconti, Pasquale Festa Campanile, Massimo Franciosa, Giovanna Cecchi, Enrico Medioli, Vasco Pratolini, stage adaptation from the Dutch by Eva Pieper and Alexandra Schmiedebach

Rocco und seine Brüder is a dark tale of brotherly love and recounts the fate of a family from southern Italy who move to northern Italy in search of a better life. It is the centuries-old story of emigration and pulling up roots, but is also a story of hope, of finding a new home at the point of arrival.

Rocco und seine Brüder follows this trail of hope from the agricultural south to the big city Milan, from impoverished tenement buildings to a family apartment, from the periphery to the centre. The world of their village Lucania accompanies the family to the city and for one member, Rocco, it remains the place to which he will return. For him the village is not simply ›back then‹ but remains ›somewhere in the future‹. The story of the Parondi family shows how emigration affects identity, and how pe ople’s self-imagechanges when they cut themselves off from their roots.

Rocco und seine Brüder is based on the 1960 film of the same name by the Italian director Luchino Visconti. On a set designed by Jan Versweyveid, Ivo von Hove has created a journey during the course of which the family will have to give up on traditional values, such as honour and solidarity. And by the end the one hanging onto the family’s traditional values, the one who loses everything, is Rocco. In his music, composer Harry de Wit reflects the tension between old and new, as his soundtrack accompanies the Parondi family on their journey.