Orlando e Angelica

The Opera of the Puppets has made the joy of the people since 1700, when the puppeteer and his traveling theater were expected in the squares of the villages of Sicily. It narrates the deeds of the paladins  Charlemagne. The main characters are Orlando, Rinaldo and the beautiful Angelica. To the cry of “Death to the Saracens” the paladins fight the Moors. To this day it remains a really exciting and fun moment to watch the exploits of these wooden puppets to which the puppeteers give life and character by acting and, at the same time, moving them from behind the scenes, while often a piano is the soundtrack to the whole thing. It should be noted that when the puppet theater withdrew from a village, the elders continued to tell the exploits of the paladins, sometimes even adding more to the story, around the conca (brazier for heating) or in the square, with friends and relatives.

Photo: Sicilian shoeshine, cc 1950