Schnapp - Fascist Mass Spectacle

39
18 BL: Fascist Mass Spectacle Author(s): Jeffrey T. Schnapp Source: Representations, No. 43 (Summer, 1993), pp. 89-125 Published by: University of California Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2928734  . Accessed: 28/10/2013 04:14 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at  . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp  . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].  . University of California Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to  Representations. http://www.jstor.org

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18 BL: Fascist Mass SpectacleAuthor(s): Jeffrey T. SchnappSource: Representations, No. 43 (Summer, 1993), pp. 89-125Published by: University of California Press

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2928734 .

Accessed: 28/10/2013 04:14

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

 .JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of 

content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms

of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

 .

University of California Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to

 Representations.

http://www.jstor.org

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JEFFREY T. SCHNAPP

18 BL:

Fascist Mass Spectacle

Moscow

OR

ROME?

The

question was posed

with

urgency hrough-

out the

1920s

and

1930s.

Socialist

pamphleteers

drew

up diagrams

to illustrate

the stark

hoice

confronting

ll

of

humankind: "Fascism

or

Communism;

Rome

or Moscow."' Fascist yndicalists

ike

Sergio

Pannunzio envisionedcontemporary

history s

a

clash

between he two ecular churches hat

had arisen after he death

of God: the fascist religionof spirit" nd the Bolshevist religionof matter."2

Others

formulated he dilemma less as a choice between Rome or Moscow than

between Rome

and Moscow versusthe old

Europe:

Italy nd Russia .. two patial nfoldings

f

history.

odern evolutions born

n

these

gigantic heaters.he first reat

n

the spiritual randeur

f itsuniversalmission.

he

second

great

n

the

human

randeur

f

ts

many eoples.

he

political rocess

hat

egan

in

1789 nd extended

nto he

apitalisthase,

now

xplodes

nd reaches

ts

evolutionary

epilogue, using

n

equal

measure

he

nduring itality

fRoman ivilization

nd thefresh

and

primitiveitality

f Moscow's

nti-civilization.3

A widespread conviction ubtends these views: namely, hat iberaldemocracy

had run its full ourse

in

history.ndustrialization

ad

ensured

the

triumph

f a

new mass society nd,

so

many

believed,the demise of all liberal forms

f social,

cultural, political,

and economic

organization.

The

bourgeois individual,

who

once stood at

the centerof the universeof

iberaldemocracy,

ad been

buried

in

the trenches f

World

War

. The

question

facing

humankind

was,

therefore, ne

of

succession.

What

sort

of

being

would takethe place of the bourgeois subject?

What

sortof mass

society

would

arise

out of the

trenches'mud? Would

the den-

tity

f the new

subject

and

society

e

anchored

in

the concept of class or

in

that

of the nation? Would theircharacterbe utopian, utilitarian, nd collectivist; r

instead

mythical, esthetic,

nd individualist? id all roads lead to Moscow or

instead to Rome?

Culture

was the

laboratory

ithinwhich a new

mass

subject

could be

shaped

and new

forms

f mass

organization

estedout.

I

use the

metaphor

of

the "labo-

ratory" dvisedly,

not

only

because it

pervades the culturaldebates

of

the

1920s

and

1930s,

fromthe Proletkult o the

Bauhaus, but also because it underscores

the

inaugural

role

assigned by

both

revolutions o cultural artifacts.Works

of

fascistor communist rt were conceived

not

merely as

instruments f propa-

ganda; theywere to serveas messengers rom he future, elaysfrom he imagi-

REPRESENTATIONS

43

*

Summer 1993 C

THE

REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA

89

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nary to

the

real,

activatingwithinthe collective's

mind and

body the entire

complex of the revolution's

alues yet o befully ealizedn history. nd since

the

values

in

questionencompassed

every

rea of human activity-fromwork to lei-

sure,

from

politics

o ethics o ndividualpsychologyo a regime

of bodilyhygiene

and exercise-culture was envisaged n total, ven totalitarian,erms.

From the start

he theaterwasthe revolutionists'rt of choice, much

as it

had

been during

the French Revolution.

Due

to its value as a tool for mobilizing n

illiterate opulation,

to

its

status

s

the preeminent

in de

sitecle

rt form, nd to

its

potential s a

total

pectacle

blending ll of thearts, he theater

underwent n

explosion

in the

yearsfollowing

he

October Revolution.Hundreds of amateur

and professional

clubs sprang up throughout

Russia and performedagitprop

works, eading

Viktor

hklovsky

o remark

wryly

hat

drama circles ..

are

prop-

agating

ike

protozoa.

Not

lack of fuel nor ack of food nor theEntente-nothing

can stoptheirgrowth."4 housands of actorsperformed n open-airmass spec-

tacles

recreating

he

events

f therevolution;worker heatersproliferated

nder

the

guidance of Alexander Bogdanov's

Proletkult; nd directors uch

as Vsevolod

Meyerholdproclaimed

"Theatrical October," aunching war

against the bour-

geois

theater s

millions tarved nd Russia battled hrough tsbitter ivilwar. By

1920,

it seemed

to

Shklovsky

hat "all Russia is acting;some

kind

of elemental

process s takingplace

where the iving abric f

ife s being transformednto the

theatrical."5

he

purpose

of

this heatricalization

f

everyday

ifewas understood

by contemporary

heorists

s

at

once

utopian

and utilitarian. hrough

the

revo-

lutionary heater

twas hoped that a

new

generation

f harmoniously eveloped

individuals"wouldbe forged.

Fascismwas

in

its

nfancy

s Russia decked

itself

ut

as

a living tage. Origi-

nating

from

within

he fold of

socialism,

he

fascistmovement

merged

in

1919

out

of

an

ill-defined

rouping

of

nationalists,rredentists,

uturists,

nd war

vet-

erans,

drawn

together

y

their

pposition

to

Italy's

parliamentarian

egime,

o

ts

politics

f accommodation

vis a

vis

a

wave

of

strikes nd

factory ccupations,

nd

to the

Treaty

of Versailles.

Although small,

the

movementwas

able to seize state

power

n

1922.

But it was not

untilthe

ate

1920s

that fascism's

culturalrevolu-

tion"

truly egan: first,

ecause Mussolini had

ruled over the old

parliamentary

stateuntil1925,whenhisdictatorshipwasdeclared; second,because fascismwas

an

inherently

nstable

deological

formation.

ascismdid not have at

its

disposal

a

complete philosophical

system

ike

that

provided by

Marxism-Leninism s

it

struggled

o

address

such

fundamental

onflicts s those

between

ts

populist

and

elitist urrents

r between

tscult

of heroic

ndividualism

nd its nstitutional

all

to order.

Rather,

fascism

was

littlemore than a

complex

of

ethical

principles,

credos,

and

aversions,

held

togetherby

a rhetorical-aesthetic

lue.

Unable to

resolve

the

question

of

its

dentity

y

means

of recourse

to the

utopias

of

theory

and

technology,

aunted

by

tsown

belatedness

with

espect

o tsBolshevik

rival,

fascismrequired (and attemptedto stimulate hroughthe lavishpatronage of

90 REPRESENTATIONS

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FIGURE 1. Ferdinando

Gatteschi,

oster

for

18

BL,

1934. Posted throughout

Florence

and reproduced in

/

-I

newspapers

and on

the cover

of Gioventfifascista,

his

/

O poster

hows the spectacle's

-

protagonist

olling

over a

line of barbedwire

early

n

-/\

t _ z

act 1.

In later

printings he

slogan

"Credere,

Obbedire,

Combattere"

"Believe,Obey,

Fight")

washandwritten ver

te truck's adiator;the

inscription

A.

Blasetti

Director" ook the

place

of

theacronym G.U.F."

-

---y i v+(Gruppi

Universitari

Fascisti).

ource: Blasetti

X i _ x

Archive.

modern art) "an

aesthetic

overproduction-a

urfeit

f

Fascist

igns, mages,

slo-

gans,

books,

and

buildings-in

order to

compensate

for,

ill

n,

and cover

up

its

unstable

deological

core."7

This is one reason

why

the fascist

egime,despite

ts

authoritarianism,ended

toward n

"eclecticism

f

the

spirit"

n

itsculturalpoli-

cies,encouraging

a

proliferation

f

competing

formulations

f

fascistmodernity,

among

which

Mussolini

felt ree to choose as a

function f

circumstance.8

This

essay

examines

one such formulation:

n

experimental

mass

spectacle

that was engaged

both

n

negotiating

he

fascist evolution's elation o

its

Soviet

predecessor

and

in

forging

n alternative

o Bolshevism'smechanicalmass sub-

ject-the

fascist

deal

of tmetallizedman."

Entitled

18

BL

(after

he model name

of its

truck-protagonist),

he

spectacle

was the featured vent

of

the

1934 Litto-

riali Della Cultura

e

dell'Arte,

fascism's

youthOlympics

of

art and culture fig.

1).9

The collaborative

reation

of seven

young

writers nd a

film

irector,

8 BL

broughttogether

wo thousand

actors,fifty

rucks, ightbulldozers,

four field-

and

machine-gunbatteries,

en

field adio

stations,

nd

six

photoelectric

rigades

in

a

stylized oviet-style

epresentation

f

the fascist

evolution's

ast, present,

18BL 91

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and future.

But however itanic

ts

cale,

ts mbitionswere even

greater:to insti-

tute a theater

of the future,

modern theaterofand

for themasses that

would

end, once and

for all, the

crisis

of

the bourgeois theater.Against

the bourgeois

stage's emphasis

on

individual

psychology,

ts reliance on the

star system, nd its

maintenance of partitionbetween interior and exterior forms of spectacle

(betweenthe

theater'sprivate

dramas and the state's

public actsof self-display),

18 BL elaborateda

total oncept

of

spectacle

founded

on fascism'swholesale

thea-

tricalization

f Italian

ife.

Moreover,

t aspired to fashion distinctive

masshero

for the new mass

theater: being cast

n

the

mage

of the nation's eader,

at once

individualized and

mass produced; a subject

identifiedwith

the transnational

values

of

industrialism,

s

well as withnew

image

and voice technologies,

ut in

whom

the

principle

f the nationcould be modernized and preserved.

t created,

in short, mass protagonist

who could

represent he

fascist evolution's

ontin-

uitieswith ts Bolshevikdouble butwho, n so doing, could also embodythe dis-

tinctive

fascist

ethos of

constant

exertion

and fatigue endured

by means of

individual and

collective iscipline.

18

BL was

but one of a number

of

interlocking heatrical

nitiatives nder-

taken

n

early

1930s

Italy,

o

I

begin byexamining

he event'sbroader context.

then

turn to

the

spectacle

tself,

o its organization, ealization,

nd failure, on-

cluding

with ome

remarks

n

fascist ulture s

a

whole.

I wish to insist

from

he

outset,

however,

hat

myobject

of

analysis

here

cannot

be designated

as the "offi-

cial theater

of

the regime."

A diversity f theaters

oexistedduring the

1930s,

some traditionalncharacter,omeavant-garde, ew propagandistic"ntheordi-

nary sense. No

simple

correlation xists,therefore,

etween state

sponsorship

and

explicit

olitical

ontent.

Those

few

major

works

hat,

ike 18

BL,

endeavored

to

devisespecifically

ascist

orms f theaterhave

generally

een dismissed

either

as "kitsch"

r as

expressions

of artistic ad

faith.

I

view

the effort

o dissect

works ike 18

BL

and

to reconstruct

he

complex

social

choreography

of their

taging

s

a

challenge

to the modes

of

writing

ul-

tural

history

hathave

prevailed

n the

study

f talian fascism.

or

reasons

having

to do with

he

urgent

need

to dismantle ascism's

ultural-politicallaims,

he first

generation

of

post-war

ultural

historians

was

averse

to an

enterprise

f this ort.

Whether

iberal

or

Marxist-affiliated,

his

generation

ook as axiomatic

Benedetto

Croce's

notion,

articulated

n

the

1925

"Manifestoof

the Anti-Fascist ntellec-

tuals,"

that fascism

nd culture were

diametrically

pposed.

Its

historiography

therefore

mphasized

apolitical

or anti-fascist

riting,

urned a

blind

eye

to the

political

commitments

f writers uch as

Giuseppe Ungaretti

and

Luigi

Piran-

dello,

and

elaborated

the fiction

hatneorealism-the characteristic

ultural

form

of

the 1930s and

1940s-represented

a revolt

gainst

the

unreality

nd

manip-

ulations

of

the fascist

poch.

Although

ts

findings

were sometimes

valuable,

this

historiographical

model

was

gradually

displaced by

more

complex

second-

and

third-generation pproaches thataddressed a questionthefirst-generationis-

92

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torians

ither ould

or would

not:

namely,

How

did

Mussolini'sregime

maintain

the support

of the Italian

populace

during

a

period

of over two decades?

Terror

and censorship

were nadequate responses;

so, inspired

by theground-breaking

work of historians

such as Renzo

de

Felice,

"consensus"-oriented

historians

turnedtheir attention o the fascist tate's nstrumentalizationf the realmsof

media,

culture,

ntellectualnquiry,

nd leisure. "Consensus"

studies

have revo-

lutionized

he study f

fascist ulturalpolitics.

Yet,

due to an inherent ias

toward

matters

f

policy

nd

a desire

to

provide

a

unified, op-down

perspective

n fas-

cist culture, hey

end to

shy

away from ustained engagements

withfascist

es-

thetic rtifacts,

ith he result

hat he atter till emain argely

unread.

I believe

that

t is

precisely

his ort

of

analysis

of the fascist

maginary

hat

must now

be

undertaken

n the

pursuit

of

a

complementary,

s

it

were

"lateral,"

perspective

n the culturalhistory

f the fascist ecades.

Cultural historians,

hat

is,need to look beyondthe broad descriptive axonomiesthat have heretofore

occupied

them

to

bring

to bear a broader

set of

methodological

tools

(psycho-

analysis,

reception

theory,

nd

so

on)

on the

reading

of the

period's

aesthetic

production.

n

so doing,

their askwill

be twofold:

n the one hand,

to

propose

new periodizations

that

help

to account

for

the

notable continuities

between

fascist-period

ulture

nd

pre-

and

post-fascist

esthetic

roduction;

on the

other

hand,

to attend

to

the

deeper question

of how and

why

a

generation

of writers

and

artists,

s well

as a

substantial

egment

f their

udience,

not

only

heard

and

gave

heed

to the

regime's

call to

forge

an authentic

fascistculture but

also

expanded upon and

reinvented

his

call,

often

transforming

t into a

personal

calling.

Fascism's

nterpellative

uccess

n

post-World

War

I

Italy,

hat

s, points

less

to the efficacy

f certain

violent actics

nd policy

nitiatives

r

to

the crisis

f

the iberal tate

han to the fact,

well understoodby

GeorgesBataille,

thatfascism

elaborated

a

myth

far

more

powerful

nd

psychologically

stute than thatpro-

vided

by

either

ts iberal

or

socialist

ivals.'0While Mussolini's

policy fforts

ave

been well described,

t s

only

recently

hat

the

persuasive

effects f

this revolu-

tionarymyth

r its bility

o sustain

plurality f

competing ultural

formulations

has begun

to be accounted

for

n

any detail."

The eventunder

consideration

here,

18 BL, put

forward ne distinctive edaction

of thisfascist

myth.Although

influentialmong intellectualsn the heady atmosphereof theearly 1930s,with

itsdebates on the collective

ovel,rationalist

rchitecture,

nd fascist

ypography,

thisversionwould prove

ess successful

n the

ong

run. And this ack

of success

renders18

BL

all the more valuable

a case study

of theuncertainties

f fascism

in

the

making.The

first

and

last)

fascist xperiment

withSoviet-style

mass the-

ater wasmany hings

o

manypeople:

to

the

fascist outh rganizations,

training

exercise;

to its director

nd hissupporters, battering

am against cultural

con-

servatives;

o the theater

community,

solution

to the

crisis

of the theater;to

Mussolini's

tate,

potential

nswer

to the vexingquestion

offascism's

cultural)

identity.n this ssay, his luster fmeanings s explored.

18BL

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Shklovsky's arlier-cited

emark

that

the fabric of Russian life was

being

"transformed nto

the theatrical" n

the wake

of the 1917 revolution ould well

be applied to fascist taly.

As

never before,

theater ame to permeate thefabric

of Italian ife

n

the 1920s

and

1930s, from he

streets o the public squares to the

factory loor othecorridors f Palazzo Venezia.Among the fascist ierarchs,no

less than six ministers

r Grand Council or Directoratememberswere

involved

with the theater:

Enrico Corradini, author of Giulio Cesare;Roberto

Farinacci,

who

penned

a

play

entitled

Redenzione;

Galeazzo

Cianno, foreign

minister

between 1936

and 1943 and author

of

La

fortuna

i Amleto; ornelio di Marzio,

creator

of

Occhi

di

gufo;

Alessandro

Pavolini,

futureMinister fPopular Culture,

author

of Le

fatalone;

nd, finally, dmondo Rossoni, head of the fascist

abor

unions and minister

f

agriculture etween 1935

and

1939, co-author

of I canto

del avoro,withmusical accompanimentprovided

by Pietro Mascagni. Never

one

to be outdone bymembers f hisentourage,BenitoMussolinidabbled frequently

in the contemporary

heater.During the 1930s he collaboratedwithGiovacchino

Forzano

on a trilogy f tragedies depictingthe lives of Napoleon, Cavour,

and

Julius

Caesar.

2

To these

exercises

n

playwrightinghowever

modesttheir

iterary

value) one must add a vigorous participation

n

debates concerning

state

patronage

of the theater

nd

opera.'3

The hierarchs'

ingular

commitment

o the art of

theater

must be

viewed

against

the

backdrop

of a

widelyperceived

and

decried "crisis

f the traditional

theater":

a crisisof

inadequate facilities,

f

a diminishing ontemporary

eper-

tory, f a falteringtarsystem,nd of audiences in decline due (or such at least

was

a

widespread

perception)

to

growing ompetition

rommovies

and

sporting

events.

t

was

as an

expression

of the former ommitment nd

in

response

to the

latter

crisis that a

series of

policy

initiatives ame about

in

the later

1920s,

designed

to achieve

three

nterrelated

oals:

first,

o absorb the

fragmented

world

of theater nto

the

regime's orporative

tructures; econd,

to

expand

the

tradi-

tional

audience of

theater,

whether

from the

standpoint

of

topography

or of

social

class,

n order to

forge genuine

mass and national

audience;

and

third,

o

alter and

ideologically

nflect he

way

n

whichtheatricalworks

were

delivered to

this new audience.

The

first f these aims was addressed via the creation

of the

Corporation

ofSpectacle n December 1930: a nationalentity ringing ogether

individuals

at all levels

of

the

music,theater,

nd

film

ndustries.'4The second

and

the third

bjectives

were addressed

via the

creation

of

"philodramatic"

sso-

ciations,

Theatrical

Saturdays,Thespian Cars,

and

open-air

festivals.

ike the

open-air festivals, philodramatic"

ssociations had

preexisted

the

March

on

Rome,

but

it

was under

fascism hat

they

ame

into theirown.

They

consisted

n

amateur drama clubs

that,

under the

aegis

of the fascist fter-work

rganization,

the

Opera

Nazionale

Dopolavoro (OND),

trained workers

n the theater arts.'5

Such clubs had

been rare

in

the

prefascist ra,

but

by

1938

they

numbered over

2,000 and performed n 1,200 theaters ll over Italy, n addition to whichthey

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staged

360

open-air

performances

before an audience

of nearly

200,000

spectators.

If the

philodramatists'

tagecraft

emained for the

most

part

traditional

(embarrassingly

o

in

the

eyes

of fascist ntellectuals),

he intended

intellectual

horizonswere hardlyprovincial.'6The juries of the annual philodramatic on-

tests lways

ncluded major

critics

ikeSilvio

D'Amico,

and the movement's

tan-

dard reference

manual was

authored

by

no less than Antonio Valente,

one of

the

designers

of the

1932

Exhibition

f

the

Fascist

Revolution

and

inventors

f

the

Carri

di

Tespi.

It called for

theater ast

n

the

mage

of "our era of

the masses":

a theater

uited

to the "incredulousand,

in

a

way,

theistic pirit

f the

modern

world"

and

founded

not on individual

protagonists,

ut nstead on an

"aesthetics

of the

company."'17

But

beyond

uch

qualitative

onsiderations,

t s the

sheer

scale

of the movement

hat

s

striking.

s

early

s

1931,

the

philodramatists

erformed

13,733plays n a singleyear.By 1938the numberofregular philodramatic ctors

had surpassed 32,000,

and

the

movementwas

administering

5

acting

schools

and

469

regional

theater

ibraries.'8

To this mass

mobilization

of

amateur

dramatists orresponded

initiatives

focused

nstead

on the

professional

heater.

he so-called Theatrical

Saturdays,"

a

program

of reduced-rate

matinee

performances

eld

in

smaller

cities,

eached

over 400,000

workers

nd

peasants

n

1936 alone.

But far

more

telling,

s

regards

the

regime's

determination

o

forge

nationalmass

audience,

were

the

Thespian

Cars:

state-of-the-artraveling

heaters

designed by

Valenteand Forzano.

First

developed

in the ate

1920s,

the Carri

di

Tespi

were

divided nto four

squadrons,

each with tsowncompanyofup tofourhundred actors,dancers,musicians, nd

staff.

hree

were dedicated

to

stagingplays;

a

fourth o operas.'9

For nearly

ten

years,

hese

four

ompanies

criss-crossed

he

peninsula

every pring

nd summer,

performing

efore

mall-town udiences

ranging

n size from woto fifteen

hou-

sand.

Their 1937

schedule,

for

nstance,

ook them over

10,000

miles,

withthe

drama cars

performing

24

timesbefore

170,000 spectators

nd the opera

car

performing

5

times

before

430,000 spectators.

The tours'

mmediatepurpose

was

thatof

bringing

provincial

udiences within he fold

of Italian high culture.

They

aimed

to further ascism's spiritual

nd intellectual eclamation"

f

Italy

and topropagatethe national anguage "inthose areaswhere dialects till eform

our marvelous

anguage."20

But on

a deeper

level,

the

medium

was the true

message. Mobile

and mod-

ular, apable

of

rapid

assembly

nd disassembly

y eamsof technicians,

eaturing

the best

n

contemporary tage

and

lighting

esign,

he

Thespian

Cars

functioned

as vehiclesfor

fascist alues.2'

Their

mere arrival

onstituted n event,

hanks o

media coverage

and

to efforts

n the OND's part

to coordinate

transportation

f

rural workers

o the show.Such

expectationswould

come to a

head on

the day of

the

performance

s the trucks

olled

into the city's

main square,

whereupon

an

armyof technicianswould feverishlyet about the taskof erectingcanvas and

18BL 95

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steel armatures.22 lways

well

attended, hispre-performance

show" was

meant

to put on display he efficiency

chieved through orporative

rganization. n the

words

of

Paolo

Orano:

The scientificisciplinefwork s appliedwith heutmost igor. very esture asa func-

tion nd is

brief,

esolute,

irm.

ands and shoulders urn oward

ieceswhoseposition

in the onstruction

s known recisely.uddenly,

he caffoldingf tubes ises

olidly p

into he ir.Every

workers a technician; e lives

nd masters he ector f material

or

which e s responsible.23

Broken

down into segmented

tasks that can

be mastered by ndividual

aborers

working

n

close collaboration,

he "scientific iscipline

ofwork"displayed n the

building process

may

sound

ust

like the sort of Tayloristdeology advocated

by

Lenin during

the

first hase

of the Sovietrevolution.24 ut it s only superficially

so inasmuch as the end producttowardwhichthe discipline trivess not a tech-

nological

utopia

founded on an ethos

of

utilitarianism.

nstead, it aspires to

realize an aesthetic"totality"

identical

to the nation): a totality mounting

to

more than the

sum of

any given

set of

individual parts,functions,

r elements.

In

the

case

of the

Thespian

Cars,

the

totality

n

question

is at

once

human,

mechanical, erial,

and

electrical.

xplicitlyssociated with

he adventof beauty,

it

claimsto resultfrom ascism's

miraculous" vercoming

f human nature, ime,

and

space-an overcoming,

however,

whose

authenticity

s

guaranteed by

its

being

bound

bynature,time,

nd space:

Everythings ntelligencendcertaintyndprecision.he skeletonakes hapebefore he

ecstatic yes

f

onlookers;

t

becomes

walls, illars,

nd vaults.

rom

he

hammer o the

bolt o

the

pulley

o

the

dynamo

o

the

generator

hat istributesnd

multiplies

nd nter-

rupts

he lectrical

urrent

or

urposes

f

ighting:

he ntire

amut

f

devices

s well s

thefull

ange

f

technicians,

tand

efore he

people.

A

people

who ees and learns

ust

how

rapidly

nd

easily

ascism'school

f nnovation

ransfigures

rudematternto

tyle,

harmony,

nd

beauty.

Here

then s the miracle

f

transformation,

f

construction,

f

making hings

men ime

pace

obey:

he

miracle,

hat

s,

ofthe

orporativege.25

The

rapid passage

described

here

from

crude matter

to

art,

from mere tech-

nology

to a

transfigured

otalitythe corporative

ge),

was central

to the

mythos

of theThespian Cars, to the"political tyle" f the fascist tate, nd, as will soon

be

seen,

to

the

concept

of

spectacle

elaborated

n

18

BL.

One

could

go

on

detailing

ther features f the

Thespian

Cars: their

refined

electrical

ontrol

booths,

their

ongitudinal

racks

for

rapid

set

changes,

and so

on. One could

also

document their

ncreasing

use as platforms

or

politicalpro-

paganda:

"Giovinezza"

and the

"Hymn

to

Rome,"

for

nstance,

were

sung

at

the

conclusion

of the

opera

car's tour

n

1937,

a

year during

which

"the

most

signif-

icant epic lyrics

oncerned

with the

Fascist

Empire"

were recited

during

inter-

missions.26

ut

the

key point

would

remain

much

the same:

through

these and

otheraspectsof theirdesign, construction,nd staging, he cars portrayedthe

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fascist government

as a

ubiquitous

agent

of

cultural-political

modernization

reachingout directly

o attend

to

the

needs

of

the

talianmasses and to

forgethe

nation

nto a unifiedwhole. Moreover,

he sleek vision

of fascist

modernity

on-

veyed

by the cars and by

their tagecraftwas

not to be contemplated n

isolation.

Rather, the "marvelous reality" hatthey would bring to the provinceswas to

resonate

ot

only

with he

open

sky

ut also with

he classical,medieval,

nd

renais-

sance

architectural ackdrops provided

by Italian cities, o as

to

imply

genea-

logical

inkbetween he nation's

pastand presentgrandeur.27

uch

indirect

orms

of allusion

to cultural

tradition

would

give way

to far more

heavy-handed

ones

during

the

period

of

Italy's mperial

dventures

n

Ethiopia,

where open-air

fes-

tivals brought

as

many

as two

million

spectators

year

into sites such as

the

Roman arena

in

Verona.28

The

initiativesust

describedreached

as

many

s three

million

talians

a

year.

Yet theywere never

ntended

as more

than a

preparatory

tage.

A second

phase

was always

envisioned

n which the

prefascist epertory

would

yield

ts

place

to

an authentic

fascist

epertory

made

up

of works that would

convey

the

revolu-

tionary

pirit

of the

times.29

his

fascist epertory

was rarely

onceived

in

nar-

rowly propagandistic

terms.

Propagandistic

ntent,

rude didacticism,

nd

an

excessive

reliance

upon

mechanization

were

among

the

features f theSoviet

ev-

olutionary

heater

most

regularly

ecried

in

the

cultural

debates

of

the

1930s,

to

the

point

that

n

1932

Mussolini went

so far as to turn down

a

proposal

for the

building

of two

national theaters

on the

grounds

that

"the

belief

that modern

facilities

ill ave the

prose

theater"

s

"a

typicallymechanico-positivist,

aterialist

error."30he solution nstead aywith ontemporaryuthors, nd to themMus-

solini

ddressed himself

n

April 1933, nsisting

hat a Statecannot create

tsown

literature."'3' e went

on to summon them "to prepare

a theater of

masses, a

theater

able

to

accommodate 15,000

or

20,000 persons

[thatwill]

stirup great

collective

passions,

be

inspired

by a

sense of

intense

humanity, nd bring

to the

stage

thatwhich

truly

ounts

n

the ifeof the

spirit

nd

in

human affairs."32

he

"theater

f

masses"

Mussolinihad

in mind

was,

n

the first

lace,

a physicalplant

akin

to a modern

sports

rena. In

the

secondplace,the phrase

envisaged

a pop-

ular,

even

populist

heater

hat

would

foregothe representation

f privateemo-

tions nfavor f "thegreatcollective assions."The taskof puzzlingout ust what

such

passions

might

onsist

n or

ust

how

one mightfind

for

them

an adequate

dramatic

form

was left

o others.

Like

many fascist

ntellectuals, lessandro Pavolini,

heoriginator

f 18 BL,

heard Mussolini's speech

as an invitation o create

a theatermodeled

afterfas-

cism's most mmediate contribution

o

Italian national ife:

the mass ralliesand

ceremonies

that had

become

a

common featureof

daily

ife since the March on

Rome.

Such an

interpretation

ould have been buttressed

by

l

Duce's

frequent

self-styling

s the

dramaturge

of

the

Italian masses.

In the phrase "stir

up the

greatcollectivepassions,"Pavolini nd his cohortsdoubtless also heard echoes of

18

BL 97

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the cultural

war

cry

of

F. T.

Marinetti's

909

Manifesto

of Futurism:

"We will sing

the great

crowdsstirred p

by work,pleasure,

and revolt;

we will singthe multi-

colored

and

polyphonic

ides of revolution n modern capitals."33

ince

futurism

had played an inaugural

role

in the rise of fascism,

or Pavolini there

could be

little oubt that he"multicolored nd polyphonic ide"bestsuited to therequire-

mentsof

both the

futuristeader and

Mussoliniwas the fascist

evolution.Here,

then,

was a fittingubject

matter

o be

sung

in

the

new

mass theater.And who

better

o sing t than Italy'syouth:

the first eneration

o have been raised

in the

bracing

climate

of the fascist ra, the

first

eneration

untainted

by the pre-fascist

past?

Pavolinihad risen

rapidly

through he ranks

of the PNF to become

the fed-

eral secretary

f the

Florentine

ascio

by

ge

26.

In this apacity

hewasentrusted

with

organizing

the

1934

"LittorialGames

of

Culture and

Art": a national com-

petition mong universitytudents n fields uch as painting,poetry, conomics,

and political

cience.35 he games

were

a

keycomponent

n

the regime's

overall

strategy

or

"avoiding

at

all

costs

a rift etween the

generation

that fought

the

war

and theRevolution,

nd

subsequent

generations."36

n the words of Achille

Starace,

national

secretary

f

the

PNF

during

the

1930s, "thegoal

of

the

Littoriali

was

and is to

directly

nfluenceyouth, purring

hem to reflect eriously

utside

the

classroom

on the most

pressing

problems

ofcontemporary olitical

nd

spir-

itual ife, n order

tohave a decisive

mpacton their raining

s a ruling

class."37

A

breeding ground

for

the future

fascist lite,these "Olympics

of

the spirit"

seemed the deal setting orthe first heater born and realized byforceswithno

prior experience

of theater

or

spectacle:

conceived

by youth,

directed

by youth,

and acted

out

by youth."38

The

project

was set

in

motion

n late

1933

as Pavolini

convened a series

of

meetings

t

the Casa del

Fascio

in

Florence,

attended

by

seven

young

to

middle-

aged

critics, laywrights,

irectors,

nd set

designers:

Luigi Bonelli,

Gherardo

Gherardi,

Sandro

De

Feo,

Nicola

Lisi,

Raffaello

Melani,

Corrado

Sofia,

and

Giorgio

Venturini. Called

in

at

a later

point

were

the

choreographerAngela

Sartorio

and

Ugo Ceseri,

the actor

who would

play

the driver

of

the lead 18 BL

truck.)

n a

period

of

intensedebate

over the so-called "choral"

novel,

the

spec-

tacle

took

shape

as

a

group

creation.

As Pavolinidescribes t:

Each

of us

contributed.

irst he

physiognomy

f the

pectacle

was

discussed,

hen deas

for ts

plot

were

putforward,

nd

finally

he dea of

articulating

he

whole round n 18

BL truckwas

seized

upon:

a truck s

protagonist;

s

single

nd collective

ersonage;

s

hero

of

the

war,

fthe

truggles

ftheFascist

quadrons,

nd

of

building rojects.39

The era

of the

masses,

t

was

thought, equired

new collective

formsof art and

new

collectiveheroes,

be

they

human or mechanical.

The

psychologism

f

the

naturalist

novel

would

have to

giveway

to

a

mass

epos that,miming

communi-

cations technologies uch as radio and following he lead of novelists ikeJohn

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Dos Passos

and the

Sovietwriters'

ollectives, ommingled

the nfinitely

ast and

the

infinitelyminute,

the

individual's

voice and

the

mob's howl."40

The

inter-

twined

realitiesof urban experience,

the

trials

of the modern

mass

individual,

could

be

represented

by pressing

modernist techniques,

ike

the

insertion

of

external bjects ntothenarrative tream nd the use of multiplenarrative oices,

into the

service

f a

distinctly

ascist

orm

f realism.Such

was the

theory

ehind

the "choral

novel"

as formulated

by the publisher

Valentino Bompiani.

It

remained

to be seen,

however,

whether he proposed

collective

pos would

be

a

matter of

process

or

simply

of

product.

In Pavolini's

experiment

the

answer

would

be "both." Every phase

of the

production

process-from

the shaping

of

the script

o theselling

of tickets-would put

on display

fascism's ulture

of

col-

lective

discipline

and

collaboration.

And the

spectacle

tself

would

place

masses

of actors

and machines

on

stage

before

a mass audience.

AmongtheplotsconsideredbyPavolini's ollectivewerea sequence ofbattles

from

World War

I,

the

so-called

eccidio

i

Empoli,

nd

the murder

of

the

young

fascist

Giovanni

Berta at the

hands of

Florentine ommunists.4'

he latter

heme

prevailed

at first,

ut as

deliberations

proceeded

the fascistmartyr

was

shunted

aside

in favor

of an 18 BL

truck.42

he selection f a truck s heromay

not

seem

self-evident, specially

given

the

importance

of

the

nationaltrain

system

o

the

fascist

magination.

ince

the late

nineteenth

entury

rainshad

indeed

become

a

privileged

symbol

of

modernization

throughout

the

world.

This was all

the

more

true

n

a

fragmented

nation such

as

Italy,

where

they

had

come to

signify

three

key

fascist conquests":

the

reimposition

f

discipline

after

the

labor dis-

ruptions

of the post-warperiod,theforging f a centralizednationalstate, nd

the

democratization

f

once-bourgeois

modes of

transport.

his rendered

trains

an effective

ymbol

of central

governmental

ower.

But

when it came

to repre-

senting

he

revolution's

eginnings,

t was the truck-the

proletarian

vehicle par

excellence-that

would

prevail

much

as

in

Bolshevist nd Maoisticonography).

In the

specific

ase of

Pavolini's

pectacle,

he

choice

of an 18

BL

was

ensured by

the fact

that this

particular

truck

was already fully enshrined

within the

mythology

f fascist

quadrism.

Featured

n

the worksof painters

uch as Mario

Sironi,

the 18

BL

merged

the

conography

f industry

with he evocation

of fas-

cism's outlaw"origins.43

A

first

reatment ntitled

18

BL was

developed fromthe

brainstorming

es-

sions held

at the Casa

del Fascio.44 ach

author was assignedthe task

of fleshing

out a subsection

of the

work

and,

after collective

discussion, the

draftswere

passed

along

to Alessandro Blasetti,

he

young

filmmaker avolini

had selected

to direct

he

spectacle.45

egarded

by

many

s the Eisenstein

f the fascist inema,

Blasetti

had

just

completed

a

suite of historical ilmsnvolving

argenumbers

of

amateur

actors,

notably ole,

TerraMadre,

nd

1860.

From these directorial

xpe-

riences Blasetti

would

bring

to

18

BL

a

battery ftechniques

for mounting

battle

scenesand achieving omplextwilightighting ffects,s wellas a stylized ealist

18BL

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~~~~~.--4-

H- - v*

*tAf 0

j;

tAcme; P.lsg

^-

J

-.@. zj

FIGURE

2

(above).

Site

map

of the "Theater of the

Masses";

La

nazione,

8

April

1934. The theaterwas builtdownriver rom he Ponte della Vittoria, eyond

the Oltrarno

neighborhood

of

San

Frediano and across

the

Arno from

he

Cascine,

Florence's

argest

public park.

Black

areas

representbuildings

nd

gray

reas vacantfields.Arrowsmarkthe two

points

of

access

to the stadium:

Viale della

Regina

(numbered tickets)

nd Via Isolotto

general

admission).

FIGURE

3

(below).

Alessandro

Blasetti,

ighting

nd

stage design

for ct

3,

pencil

drawing

on

mimeograph,

1934.

The

positions

f

searchlight rigades

are

indicated

by

numbered boxes. Numbers

within

ircles ndicate

taging

reas

connected

by

field

elephone

to home

base

(1).

Lettersmark

the

principal

roads

traversing

he

stage.

Cross-hatched ones stand

for

thecanted

platforms

n

whichthe action unfolded. Pencilled-in rrows

ndicate

the

movement

f

trucks

and actorsfromroad C toA, thenonto and off hecenterofthestageunder

searchlights ,

1

1,

and 12. Source:

BlasettiArchive.

C)1

.0-- .... -,x

-

100 REPRESENTATIONS

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FIGURE

4.

Left ide of stage during act 2, press

photo, 1934. This photo seems to show Road A

bending

around the central

part

of

the

stage,

withRoad

B

entering

t

from eft.Note staging

platform

n

rear center, ower ines running

along

back of the

stage,

nd control

booth

n

foreground,

overed

n

brush and

camouflage.

Source: Blasetti

Archive.

mode

of narration

lwaysopen

to

allegorical ntimations. lasettireworkedthe

collective's exts

with

he demands

of

staging

uch a

large spectacle

n

mind,car-

rying ver

fromhis films

umerous formal nd thematic lements.46During the

ensuing

monthsof

preparation

he would

adopt,

for

nstance, ole's Manichean

dialectic

of

darkness and

light, ccording

to which the Pontine

marshes repre-

sented the values of

"darkness and old

age"

and the reclaimed

swamps

the

promise

of

"sun and youth."47

romTerra

Madre,he would borrow he mass open-

air

ceremonials nd use of ntervals

f

silence s a

dramaticdevice.

From

1860 he

would

carryover,among many

other

ngredients, he film's ast andscape set-

tings; tsmyths f rural virtue nd urbanvice; tsmasschoreographies; tsuse of

songs, flags,

and

banners;

its

tendency

to

create dislocated relations between

bodies

and

voices;

its

oblique presentation

f

Garibaldi

through

he masses con-

vergingtowardunity

under his

leadership;and the triumphalparade featured

in

its

coda.48

But

the first hallenge facingBlasettiwas less the script han the design and

18BL 101

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construction

f

an outdoor theater:

an arena,

as per

it

Duce's orders,

"able to

accommodate

twenty housand

persons." This Blasetti

set about withseveral

dozen workers,

team

of

thirty

arth

movers,

nd withbarely six weeks

at his

disposal.49 nspired perhaps

by ontemporary rojects ike

WalterGropius's total

theater" and Gaetano Ciocca's teatro er masse, he youngdirector had initially

dreamed

ofbuildingan amphitheater hat

would turn theconventional

Greco-

Roman theater

nside out: placingthe audience

at the center of a crater,

ur-

rounded

by a circular

upward sloping stage.50

But practicalfactors ed

to the

adoption

of an alternate

plan (fig.2).

The

site selected

for

18

BL

was

on the left

shore

of

the

Arno,

across

from

he Cascine, Florence'sprincipal

public park.The

terrain,

knownas the

Albereta

dell'Isolotto,

was cleft

n

twobya deep gully Via

Argin Grosso)

which

the

city

uthorities greed to expand

so that Blasetticould

transform

t

nto a

command post

and

lighting

it.

The

gently loping

riverbank

to thenorthwas chosenas a seating rea; thesteeper nclinerisingup to the south

as

a

stage.5'

The

stage

was

roughly

ix

hundred feet wide bytwo hundred feet

deep, occupying

n area

equivalent

to two

and

a

half footballfields.Blasettihad

a

series

of

artificial

illscarved nto this

platform:

three-steppedhill to the eft,

a

two-stepped

illto the

right,

nd,

at the

center,

three-hundred-foot-longidge

with

basin hollowed out

in

its

middle,

behind

whichrose a conical hilltop-the

stage's highestpoint figs.

3 and

4).

Some

twelve

taging

reas

were cut into

the

various hillsides

for the

preparation

of

the

spectacle's

cenes,

as well as a circuit

of

roads and trenches

for

moving ctors,

rtillery, orses, nd trucks.

A network

of field

telephones

was installed to ease communicationsbetween

the staging

areas and

the director's

headquarters.52

Since

this

was a

stage

without

curtain,

Blasetti

determined that the

action

should

migrate

fromone area

of the

stage

to

another,following

he

movements

of Ceseri

and

his truck. While

the

spectacle

unfolded

withinthese

sharply

it

zones,

new scenes

could

be

prepared

in

the darkened

areas; during pauses

in

the

main

action,

thunderous

ounds

and

luminous effects

would]

draw

the

public's

attention

oward

zones extraneous

to the action"

n

order to

"hold

together

he

dramatic

design

of the action

fromone moment to another."53

iven that

both

sides

of

the

stage sloped steeply

downward,

Blasetti

nvisaged

18

BL

as a kind

of

shadow play nreverse,withfigures isingup and disappearingrapidlyoverthe

horizon

ine.

The

actors

and

machines,

hat

s,

would

be

viewed

in

profile

from

below,

s

in the films

f Alexander

Dovzhenko. Their

silhouettes,

ut out

against

either

the

night

ky

r

against

fields

f

light

produced by

means

of

pyrotechnics

and

searchlights,

would

thereby ppear

to

have been raised

to a

higher,

more

volatile

plane

of existence:

a

plane

defined

by

the

propensity

f these

sharply

outlined bodies

and

machinesto

suddenly

emerge

out

of or

dissolve

nto seas

of

darkness

or brilliant

ight fig. ).54

In

addition

to

lighting,

here

was

a second

element that

would

sustain

dra-

matic tension in 18 BL: the alternationbetweensilence and the "thunderous

102

REPRESENTATIONS

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sounds" alluded to above.55The scale of Blasetti's

tage

was such that

micro-

phones had to be planted

throughout

he

andscape in order

to ensure thedif-

fusion

of

the

work's

erse

dialogues

and

choral shouts.The

musicalscore,

songs,

and

sound effects ere all recorded nadvance for

broadcastover the same loud-

speakers employed by

the

microphones.

The

procedure

was not unlike that

adopted in 1860 where, nordertoavoidthe imitationsmposedbybulky ound

equipment,Blasettihad the

film

hot s

if

ilent, ubbing thedialogue and sound

effects ver

what,

n

essence,

was a silentfilm.

his

recourse

to

microphones

nd

a recorded soundtrackwould later

prove

controversial,56

ut ts

principal

im was

to

permit

ctors to move about without

oncern for

whether

hey

ould or could

not be heard.57 t also

permitted

the

amalgamation

of

natural

and artificial

sounds:

mechanically reproduced music,

voices,

and

machine sounds could

thereby

e

intermingled

with ive noises

produced

on

stage

by actors,weapons,

and trucks o as to create an unstable

boundary

between the real and the

magi-

nary.58

Moreover,

t

allowed

for

some

highly

riginal spatialeffects,

orming

a

vastsonic field hat,besidessurrounding heaudience,can movesounds, songs,

rhythms,nd noises close

up

or

far away."59 ut

most mportant f all, n a

spec-

tacle within

which

a few individuals would

speak

for

the

nation,

t

permitted

amplification.

"vocal

gigantism"

ould be

achieved

thatwould

grantthe occa-

sional

dialogues exchanged

among

the

human

protagonists

riority

ver

the sea

of machine noises.60

Because

this

heater or he masses was

also meant

as a theater f he

masses,

the

seating

area too was

designed

as a

theatrical

pace.

Shaped

like a

rectangle

with curved

back,

t was flanked n

both sides

by high embankment.Much

as

FIGURE 5. "Act

:

NetworkfBarbedWire

Under

Enemy Reflectors," ress

photo,

1934.

Source: Blasetti

Archive.

18BL

103

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in a modern sports

arena, the more expensive numbered

seats

(5,000)

were

placed along

the central xis,

and the nexpensive

popular"

seating reas (15,000

places) relegatedto

the flanks.6'

his distinction

etweennumbered and

unnum-

bered seatingmay

eem perfectlyrdinary.

ut itbecomes somewhat

ess

so when

one observesthat t correspondsto a complex social choreography, eflectedn

turn

n

the

play's

taging

of the dialecticbetween

mass man and the

heroic ndi-

vidual.

Two separate entrances

were provided for

the public. The

one on the

Oltrarno side

of

the

river was restricted o the

popolari,

who were

obliged

to

assemble

in

Piazza Gaddi

and descend

a blind alleyway

known as Via Isolotto:

a

"natural"

tinerary iven that

manyofthemwould

be arriving

rom he adjacent

proletarian

neighborhoodof

San Frediano

siteof Berta's

"martyrdom"). s they

entered the mist-filled

tadium, hese working-class

pectatorswould

have been

dazzled by eighteen

arge open

books topped bybayonets

built

n

a

ring around

the stadium's periphery.Powerful floodlightswere pointed against the books'

white

pages

so as

to bounce

light

back out

into

the stalls.

Amidst these pages yet

to

be inscribed

by

the first

eneration

of fascistyouth, hepopolari

would have

gazed upon

the

procession

of

dignitaries

ntering he theater'smiddle

section.

The latter

wouldinclude

writersike Ugo Ojetti

and Massimo

Bontempelli,most

of

Italy's

heater

ritics, nd

hierarchs ike Galeazzo Ciano,

so an equationwould

have been implied

between

fascist aces,fasces,

weapons, and books.62

The

elite

members

of the

public

would reach theirnumbered

seats

by

fol-

lowing

an

itinerary

estricted

o the

city

ide of the river.

Having

traversedFlor-

ence's

affluent

nineteenth-century

eighborhoods, they

would have

reached

Piazza Zuavi, proceeding

down the spacious

tree-linedpromenades

of the

Cas-

cine

to

the theater's rue entrance:

a

bridge

of

riverboats,

it

by

torches held

by

boatmen

(fig.

6).63

Boat-bridgeswere

one of themost ancient

formsof military

bridging,

o the

symbolism

f

moving

crossthe river oward

a

"theater

of

war"

as

if

one were a soldier

could not have

been loston the audience. But

the

primary

aim

was

surely ymbolic.

quote

from

contemporary

ource:

For

thisnew

type

f

theater

new method

f

entry

was

essential.

he theater

f the

Albereta

s a

kind f naccessible

ermetic

emple:

will t

be,

midst

he

nightlights,phan-

tasmagoriaecreatinghemythshatWagner

onceived

or

he

Bayreuthtage

but with

entirely

ewmeans han hose fwhich e

disposed?

ere we aredealingnotwithmyth,

but

with

ontemporary

istory.

evertheless,

he atter

s

sufficientlyoetic

o

partake

f

the

ppearance

nd

fascination

f

myth.64

Traversing

this

bridge,

standing

under a celestial

X formed

by

beams

of

light

projected

from

pposite

sides

of the

Arno,

the

spectator

would have

gazed down

the

river nd

over

the

city's

ooftops pon

such monuments s Giotto's

bell tower.

He

would then

have

completed

his

"walk

on the

water,"

ascended

a broad

stairway,

nd

passed

through

a

triumphal gateway

of

fasces marked

with

the

Roman numeral twelve datingthespectacleaccordingto therevolutionaryal-

104

REPRESENTATIONS

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FIGURE

6. Giannetto annucci nd Maurizio empestini,oat

bridge ntrance

o

Theater

f

theMasses, en and nkdrawing,

1934; GuidoSalvini, Spettacoliimasse 18 BL,"Scenario,no.5

(May, 934): 251-55. As ndicated

n

this arly esign, he nitial lan

was for doubleboatbridge.As ate s 22 March1934,Blasetti

pleadedwith ocalmilitaryuthoritiesor dditional oats, earing

that single ridge ouldnothandle hemass fspectators. dearth

ofboats nsured he

doption

fa

single ridge

olution.

endar). Beyond hegatewayaythe cement ookswith ayonets nd, beyond

them,

he

misty

wirl f the assembled

rowd urrounded ytheTuscan and-

scape

nd under he

night ky. here,

he

heart f thehermetic

emple

would

t

last

havebeen

reached: place

f

mass ommunion here hedistinctionetween

members

f

the

priesthood

nd mere

believerswas maintained,ven as they

rubbed houlders nd merged nto single ommunity.

18 BL's first nd onlyperformanceookplace on 29 April 1934,one week

after

he

opening ay

ceremonies

f

theLittoriali.

he sell-out udience ssem-

bled

according

o

plan

and

the

bridge,

hevarious

massing oints, nd the

book-

lit

uditorium

ll seemto

have nfused he ssembled pectators ith he sense

that hey hemselves ere heprotagonistsf Mussolini'smasstheater: There

werenot3,000 ctors,"bserved neaudiencemember,but 3,000."65he two-

hour how

egan

with

he

tage

nd the

eating rea veiled

n

a curtain f moke.

At the

appointedhour, call

to

order oundedoverthe oudspeakers nd the

lightsnd smokewereextinguished,xposing o view he mmense tage, he

surroundingandscape,

nd

the

night ky.

he

firstftheplay's

hree

ctsbegan

with he

trumpet

alls from he

openingbars of Renzo Massarani's rchestral

18BL

105

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score, Squilli

e danzeper

ii

18 BL.66

Then came

the broadcast of the

spectacle's

leitmotif,The Captain's

Testament,"

World War I hymn

associatedwith the

Alpine brigades instrumental

n

Italy'svictory

ver Austria n the

battle of the

Piave River.

The actionmaybe summarized as follows.Act 1, scene1. The location and

volume

of the chorusof voices oscillate

as a

light cans the rightportion

of the

stage,finding odies,

barbwire, nd galloping

horses. Suddenlythe

rumble of an

18 BL Fiat truck

s heard

and, as itcrossesover

the horizon ine, artillery

arrages

lightup the night ky.

A spotlight evealsthe truck's

estination: everal

hundred

second-line

talian

soldiers

to whom its driver,Ugo Ceseri, delivers

rations and

mail.

The

truck's

nickname,

"Mother Cartridge-Pouch" Mamma

Giberna), s

shouted

out

in the

course

of

a dialogue.67

cene2. New volleys re

fired

n the

distance

as a machine-gun

battle has front-line

talian soldiers pinned

against

barbed wire on the middle hilltop.The trucknow rambles up the slope, its

armored

shield riddled

by

bullets.

Snippets

of

dialogue

can be heard interwoven

withmechanical ounds.

The driverheaves food sacks

nto trench nd continues

downthe backside of

the slope out of view.Scene

. The

truck eappears around

the corner

of the third

hill.

The twilight eveals that

t is brimmingover with

young

soldiers who

are

being

transported

o the front.Several

dozen 18 BLs

follow

n its

wake

and

unload

their

oldiers,

who

oin

in

an assault across the top

of the

ridge.

Machine-gun

battles start

and

stop

until

victory

s at hand. Far

behind

the firsthill,

an Italian flag

is

hoisted

against the light of

a sign that

announces the conquest

of

Trento

and Trieste.

Ceseri's truck

eads a parade of

18 BLs

over the horizon

towardthe

flag,

ccompanied by song.

End of act

1.

The transition etween

World War

I

and the abor

strikes f

1922

is marked

by

the

firing

f

a curtain

of red fireworks

ver the

public.

Act

2,

scene1.

Beyond

the redrain,

the

repositioned tage

ights

eveal a new

andscape

on the

efthand

side

of

the

stage.

Strewn cross

t are abandoned

work

mplements,

attered

hay-

stacks,

otting roduce.

Factory

irens

ound but theirwail s soon distorted

nto

the

squawk

of

rusty ears

and

the electronic

rowl

of

a

howling

mob. Ceseri

and

his mechanic

attempt

to

unload

their 18 BL's

cargo. They preach

against

the

strike nd become

the

target

of

a

mob of strikers

randishing

red

flag.

The

mob's"mechanicalhowl"-the phrase sfrom hescript-growstodeafeningpro-

portions

s

the

strikers atter

he truck nd leave

the mechanic

unconscious.

At

this nstant

he

truck's

ngine

starts

p.

The circleof strikers

pens

up

and Ceseri

can

be heard

crying

out for

revenge

as the truck flees

nto

a

gully.

Scene

2.

A

banquet

table

bearing

the word

"PARLIAMENT"

appears

atop

the

central

hillock.Seated

at

the table are

politicians

epresenting

he

liberal,

socialist,

nd

popular parties.

Some wear

black tuxedos

and

oversize

top

hats that

hang

down

over

their

eyes;

others are

sloppily

dressed and

full

of rhetorical

bluster.

The

strikers

ally

round

them,

remaining

ilent

except

for an occasional

chorus of

"Long live thepeople's representatives "oon allconversationhasceased and the

106

REPRESENTATIONS

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only

noises that an be

heard

are

those of

knives langing

on

plates.

An

applause

then

rings

ut. A socialist olitician

tands

up

to begina speech. Instead

of a

voice,

however,

he

sound of a barrel

organ

issues from

his mouth: a wind-up

organ,

like that

mployedbybeggars

withmonkeys, laying he

Dance of the Seven

Veils

from the opera Salome.Behind him, hundredsof slogan-bearingballoons float

into thesky

filledwith mpty

promises."

The barrel organ churns

awayfor sev-

eral

minutes,

fter

which

t

begins

to wind down as a newsboy

ries

out headlines

announcing

the foundation

f fascist

roups.

The music

stops.

One of the

elders

croaks

thewords

of

Luigi

Factabefore the

March

on Rome:

"But

what

do

these

Fascists

want?"

At this nstant

Mother Cartridge-Pouch

hundersdown the

hill

and

overturns he tables

of

parliament.

Afterward

Ceseri harangues the

mob:

"One

hundred

and

thirty

million

n

damages

to

farming

hanks

to the socialist

dictatorship

n theBologna region

Workers,

when willyou

freeyourselves

rom

yourmystifyingeaders?" Scene3. Fire alarmsringout. Fascisthymns re sung

far away

and

nearby.

A

factory

s ablaze

in

the

left orner of the

andscape.

Ces-

eri's

18

BL,

filledwith lack

shirts, oes

to the rescuebut sambushed

by

n

armed

socialistmob.

Bullets

fly

nd,

when

the

ambush

is

over,

darkness redescends.

In

the twilight

ne can see

the

fascist

ead beingheaped

onto the

platform

f Cese-

ri's truck,

s if

an altar. The truck

rolls up to the summit

of the stage's

central

crest. Two hundred

fascists onverge upon

the

truck,

rranging

themselves

n

formation

nd

standing

mutely

t

attention

fig.

).

Over the horizon a white

ight

glows

withever increasing ntensity.

rom

out of the light, "metallic

nd clear

voice" (Mussolini's)

nterrupts

he funereal

silence, calling out:

"Heroes of the

war and martyrsftherevolution " Present," hey nswer. To whomdoes Italy

belong, to

whom

Rome?"

"To

us,"

they

answer.

But

the

chorus of voices

is no

longer

solated. Black

shirts

houtout "to us" from ll sides

of the

auditorium

nd

stage.

Led

by

a

truck

onvoy, heyparade

out across the andscape

and converge

over the horizon line,where

their silhouettesvanish into the

light. Act 2 has

ended; the March

on Rome has begun.

The final

act of 18

BL

concerns one

of the centerpiecesof

fascistdomestic

policy:

the

draining

of the Pontine

marshes,

the

reclamation

of marshland

for

purposes

of

farming,

nd

the construction here

of

fascist ew

towns. ince these

eventsprojectthe action of 18 BL tenyearsforward,Blasettidevised a second

interlude o markthe shift

rom he

early 1920s

to 1932 duringwhich

squadron

of

airplanes

overflew

he crowd and

dropped

broadsheets

celebrating he

prin-

cipal

accomplishments

f fascist

ule.68 ct

,

scene

. The lights rop and a

heroic

dance

music sounds.

The

stage

s

aswarm

with

hildren,who wend their

way up

over the

horizon

following

urrows

ut

nto the and

bypeasants,

whose tools are

in view. The

children are followedby one hundred athletes

n

formation,

who

perform

gymnastic

ance

with ances and bows: emblems

of the "human rec-

lamation"

ccomplished

byfascist ducation.

Scene . Off n a hollow

to the

eft,

swampcomes into view under a faintgreenishspotlight.Filled with reeds and

18BL 107

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FIGURE 7. "Act , Scene2: Present ,"ress hoto, 934.

In

the

dark ilence.. a beam hines orthvermorebrightlyrom

behind

he

hill f the

pectacle.

vermorenumerous

ascist

squadronsmutely

onverge rom ll directionsn evergreater

numbers. heygather

ound he ltar nd biers f themartyrs.

Rigid, t attention,hey orm square";from heoriginal

script,

18

BL:

Spettacolo

i masse

per

l

popolo,"

Gioventis

fascista, no.

8

(15

April1934):13.Source:Blasetti

rchive.

bubblingwithmud, temanates roglikeroakingsntermingledith oices f

rumor nd doubt.As thegymnastsepart ne mutters,

Billions pent o uglify

therace

Violent nd

gnorant

enerationsre being ashioned,ungry

or

war,

slaughter,

nd

excess.. "

The

rumor-mongering

ontinues

until, top

the

hightestoint n the tage, monumentaligure n horseback

ppears nprofile

against ntersecting

eams f

ight:

he

Commander. e

utters wo

teely ords:

"Qui. Colmata."Here.

Landfill.) legion f trucks oarsup andbegins o fill n

the swamp.The Commander otates

180

degrees and issues

an orderto a

squadron

f

bulldozers n the ther

ide

of

the

tage:

In three

ays,

heroad to

Littoria ill ross

his oid.Wewill

work ll night."cene .

The entire tage s it.

On the

eft,

he

illingperationontinues;

n the

ight,

he ulldozers

nd

trucks

carve ut highway.ereand there acks fworkersanbe seen illinghe and.

A

factory histle ounds,marking

he

end of

the

night hift.

he trucks ead

back otheir heds s

revolutionaryongs

re

sung.

The

stage

s eft mpty xcept

for few

tragglers

hose anter

s

overheard s they

wait

ridefrom

Mother

Cartridge-Pouch,

ow

ebaptized

ld

Cartridge-Pouch.

till

riven

yCeseri, he

arrives rom

ffstageight,

attered nd torn.

Although

ble to transporthem

108

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halfway

cross the stage, her

motor

s blown

and

soon beginsspewing

moke.

All

efforts

t revivalfailand,

instead of abandoning

her,theydecide topush

her

up

to

the lip

of

the

firstwamp.

As she wobbles toward the precipice,

trucks

filled

with

workers rrive

on the scene. They

surround her

and

shut off heir ngines.

The lefthillock s now ablaze "in themode of dazzling transfigurationsr the

head

of Moses" amidst

the dead silence.69

Ceseri stands

at the center

of this

funereal omposition

nd proclaims:

She has fought he war,

he revolution,

nd

the battle f and

reclamation.Now

she

will

upport

the highway o

Littoria."The

old truck s pushed

over the precipice

and buried, as

Ceseri prophecies

her

return:

In three

days she will return

o her dutiesanew,

my old lady.Forever "

The trucksdepart

and

pass

above

her,barely

visible,

s the sound

of

marching

drums

is

heard,

blended

with

music. White buildings

flicker

n the distance as

Italymarches off

owardthe city

of

the

future: Littoria,first

f the fascistnew

towns.A trumpet all heard offn thedistance choes backwithredoubled force.

War,

revolution,

econstruction:

hesewerethe three

great

themes

of 18

BL's

theater

of

and

forthe

masses.

However crude its

unfolding

fthese themes

may

sometimes seem,

the

spectacle

aspired

to

elevate

contemporary

history

o

the

status

of

mythby

means

of

a

hybrid

tagecraftmerging

hyperrealism

with

lle-

gory,

nd

even

political

aricature.70

n

an

era

when the

transition

rom ilent o

talking

ilmswasbeingcompleted,

t

tried o

adapt

to the

stage

the

use

of

ayered

soundtracks,

inematic

ighting

ricks,

nd

editing techniques

such as

montage

and

the

rapid

crosscutting

f scenes.7'

But,

for all

its

attempts

o

transport

ine-

matic ensations

o the

stage,

18

BL

also

set

out

to transcend

he cinema and

forge

a hallucinatory ewdramaticform. t setout to achievea higher,more distinc-

tively

ascist

ormof

tragic

pathos,

"to

embody

the

real

and

the

symbolic

imul-

taneously,

reating

kind

of

actualized

mystical xperience

..

of

a

heroic

subject

matter."72

n the words

of

Corrado

Sofia,

one of

18 BL's authors,

t

sought

to reawaken

he same

enthusiasm

xpressed

y

rowds

n

sports

renas nd

perhaps

o

succeed

n

being

more eductivehan he inema,

ecause

ctual

oices nd human igures

and

the

open

air

that urrounds

he

stage,

re all sources f

nstinctualttraction.

he

cinema

hrusts

he pectatornto dark

oom.Onthe creen tpresents

latnd colorless

figures.

y its nature

t s tied to documentarynd

scientificorms, ather

hanto an

imaginationapable fenveloping actsnmystery.73

Sofia's theorization s exemplary

nasmuch

as

fascism's ttitudetoward

the film

medium

had

been ambivalent

rom

he start.On the one hand,

fascism elebrated

cinema as the state's

most

potent

weapon";

on the

other,

n aversiontoward

the

medium tself

rompted

fascism

o

single

out

the theater s the privileged

fascist

art and

to

place

theatrical alues

at the centeroffascist olitics.

Film, Sofia sug-

gests,

s

by

ts

very

nature a decadent

medium. It attenuatesthe bond

between

spectators'

nd

performers'

odies,

reducingthe world

to a series

of flat and

colorlessprojectionsmeantforsilent nd solitary ontemplation.The theaterof

18BL 109

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masses,on the

contrary, estores o thebody ts entral ole and in

so doing forges

a transformative,

utuallyeductive elation between representation nd

reality,

art and

life.The

mass audience

and

mass performerseave behind

the cloistered

interiors

f

the

old theater nd cinema in order to stand before

one another n

actualtime nd space,undertheopen sky.Within hisnatural etting n "instinc-

tual attraction" etween them can break down the barrier betweenauditorium

and

stage, provoking

he sort

of

healthy ontagion fosteredby athletic

ventsor

mass rallies.

And

the spectacle

tself s

designed

to

excite such

primordial pas-

sions.

Plot is

stripped

down

to

its

minimal constituent lements:

hero versus

antihero,

lack

versusred versuswhite.Actions re simple,readily ccessible, nd

anchored

in

the historical

resent.

The

poetic

word is subordinated to the

mys-

terious

play

of

imagesand rhythms.74hysical ctions,optical tricks,

crobatics,

magic,

fireworks

.. in

short,

xternal

ffects nd affects ccupy the

place ofhonor

once held in the theaterbythevaluesof individuality nd interiority.75nd the

end

result

toward

which

this

complex

of

techniques

strives s the

forging

of

a

charismatic

ommunity,

microcosm

f

the

fascistized talian nation:

"the fusion

of thousands and thousands

of

souls

within

single framework

f

ideas and

events."76

Such

at

least was

the theoreticalmatrixwithinwhich

the creators

of 18 BL

were

operating:

a

modernistmatrix ndebted to

Bontempelli's

notion

of

"magic

realism"

nd to his writings

n

theater

nd

sport.77 nfortunately

orBlasetti nd

his

collaborators,

8 BL

fell short

of

fulfillinghese ambitions.The

new theater

of the

masseswas applauded, praised

for

ts audacity and patriotic

entiments,

but it

was ust

as

often dismissed as

a

resounding flop.

To

make

matters

worse,

the

atter

erdictwas

trumpeted y

Corrado

Sofia,

who aunched a

series

of

fierce

attacks

gainst

Blasetti

from he

pages

of

Quadrivio.78 lready

n the months

pre-

ceding the performance

here had been hints

of

rivalry.79 ow

Sofia came

out

into the

open

and

accused Blasetti

of

a

long

list

of

"treasonous"

acts:

of

having

been a

poor

director

o start

with;

of

havingneedlesslydestroyed

he

lead

18 BL

truck;

f

developing

the

spectacle

round machines

nd mechanized

voices when

Italians were "staunch

nemies

of

machine-worship";80

nd

of

having

wanted

"to

revolutionize verything

n littlemore than a

month"when "revolutionsmustbe

prepared carefully n even the most minimal

particulars."8'

Blasettiresponded

angrily

n La

tribuna,

ccepting

blame for 18 BL's

failings

ut

calling

attention

o

Sofia's

volte-face:

nly

weeks

before

Sofia was

taking

full

redit

forthe

spectacle;

now he

pretended

to

have

been disaffected

rom he

start.82

counterattack

ol-

lowed severaldays

ater

nd featured uch accusations

s thatBlasetti's

rue ambi-

tion

n

18

BL had been

to

gain

for

himself

government ension.83

his

in turn

provoked yet

another

furious

rejoinder,

as

well as intercessions

on

Blasetti's

behalf

by

Leo Bomba and

Gherardo

Gherardi.84

As

might

have

been

anticipated,

echnical

problems

contributed

heir

hare

to the mixed receptionthatgreeted18 BL. The vaststage had diminishedthe

110 REPRESENTATIONS

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audience's

ability

o

participate

n

every

ction. Able to hear

but unable to

see,

many pectators

would

feel no "instinctual

ttraction"

owardthe mass

of protag-

onists

on stage. Instead of being transported

nto an

unstable realm

wherethe

threshold

between reality nd

some

magical/mythical

omain

appeared

perme-

able,they

would be

left,

ike

Bontempelli

himself,with lingering

sense

ofemp-

tiness,depression,and coldness."85Visibility roblemswere aggravatedbythe

discontinuous

nature

of thenarrative,

nd

by

theoften wkward

ynchronization

between

the soundtrack

nd

the events

on

stage.

Not least

of all, there was

the

performance's

inale,

which Blasetti

had not been able

to

rehearse.

In

a near-

disastrous

Pirandellian

twist,

Mother Cartridge-Pouch

had changed

her

mind

about being

buried

at the last moment

and for several tense minutes

the

com-

bined forces

f a dozen actors

proved nsufficient

o

roll her over

nto the swamp.

In the

end they

did succeed, but only

afterBlasetti

switchedoff

he lights nd

summoned

a second

truck.

When

the

lights

came back

on Mother

Cartridge-

Pouch was in her grave,but many spectatorshad already departed and the

intended tragic

ffect ad

been buried

long

before

the

truck.86

Technical

deficiencies

here were,

but at the heart

of the controversy

ur-

rounding

18

BL

loomed

the

deeper

questionof whether

machine was a fitting

hero

for the fascist

heater.Some young

members

of the crowd thought

not,

greeting

he event's

conclusion

with

cries

of

"What

the hell do

we care about a

truck?"87

he

objection

would be

repeated

often n the

ensuing

months f

debate,

always

n

tandem with

criticism f

the

collective

drafting

f 18

BL's

script. For

the

fascist

magination

mechanization

nd collectivization

ere ndissociable.)

n

the wordsofthe novelistUgo Ojetti, The idea ofmaking machine ntoa hero,

whether hat,

s some say but

I doubt),

of Mussolini,

or instead of

Marinetti r

Pavolini,

s

a

stupid

dea.... Art s

man. Machines without

men are soulless

wood

and

metal;

and

they

re

mass-produced

as

equal,

nay,

dentical."88 jetti's

aver-

sion

to

mechanical

heroes is motivated

by

the fear thatthey summon

up

the

specter

of a soulless mass

society:

society

ounded

not

on the values

of nation-

alism

but

on those

of internationalism. uch a society

had

a name, and

other

commentatorswould prove

ess reticent egarding

ts dentity:

mechanicalheroes

"are

well suited to

peoples

for

whom

the

machine

has become a religion. 4.

To

drawnear to such mentalitiesmakes it more difficult o uproot

the error

com-

mitted

by

those

who,

after

cursory

ook at our

affairs,

would liken

our Revolu-

tion

to the

Russian

revolution."89

or

theseand otherlike-minded

viewers,

he

recourse

to

a mechanical

protagonist

nd the

collective uthorship

of the script

raised grave

doubts

about

fascism's

pecificity.ike

its enemytwin,

fascism

was

committed

obuildingan industrial

mass society,which s to

say a societydepen-

dent

upon

the close

interconnection etween machines

and human

beings.

Yet

fascism

lso claimed

to stand

n

opposition

to

Marxistmaterialism,

tilitarianism,

and

collectivism,

nd

in

favor

f

values associated withvague

terms

uch

as

soul,

spirit,

eauty,

heroism, ndividualism,

nd Latinity. ould such

values,

however

18BL

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defined, be

fully econciled

with

mechanization

nd

industrialization?

erhaps

not

for a cultural

conservative

uch

as Ojetti,

but for

committed

modernists

ike

the

creatorsof

18 BL the answer was

affirmative.

The spectacle's

detractors

were right

n at least

one important

espect:

18 BL

was indeed hauntedbySoviet antecedents.The machineas protagonist f mass

actions

had

long been

one

of the heroic themes of

Soviet culture,

a fact

amply

documented

in

Rene

Ffildp-Miller's

i

volto el bolscevismo,

contemporary

est-

seller

thathad

devoted two hapters

o

the

Soviet

revolutionary

heater. t

claimed

that

under socialism

the

mitation f

machineshas

been

raised to the

statusof

a

sacrament,

omparable

to the mitation

f Christ,"

nd discussed at length

Soviet

experiments

with ollective uthorship.90

he

Soviet nterest

n

developing

mod-

ernist

forms of

epic

founded upon

the interactionbetween

machinery

and

human

masses

would

also have

reached Blasetti

nd his

cohorts

via the

cinema.

Eisenstein's

theoretical

writingswere

available

in translation

nd,

by the early

1930s,

Italian cinemaclubs had started o exhibithis silentfilms, romTheBattle-

ship

Potemkin

o the

quasi-documentary

The General ine,

whose final parade

of

tractors

was

a probable

source

for 18

BL.91 But an even

more direct source

of

inspiration

were

the

Soviet

revolutionary estivals,

vant-garde

experiments

n

mass

pageantry

that had

stimulated

great

interest

n

Italy

during

the cultural

debates

of

the

early

1930s.92

Among these,

the most immediately

pertinent

s

perhaps

The Stormingf

theWinter

alace,

a

collectively

uthored

reenactment

f

the

events

of October

1917

cast

n the same

hyperrealist

et

llegorizing

mold

as

18

BL. Performed

n

Petrograd's

Palace

Square

in

1920

before a public

ofnearly

100,000,thismultimedia pectaclesurrounded ts8,000 protagonistswith gun-

fire,

rtillery,

ockets,

nd a

panoply

of

lighting

ffects.93

nd

as

can be

seen

in

several contemporary

rawings

nd

photographs,

ts climactic

pisode

featured

a

white

truck

carrying

he

fleeing

Kerensky

government

with

a

platoon

of

Red

Army

trucks

n hot

pursuit.

Other

parallels

could

be cited from

works such

as

Yurii

Annenkov's

The

Mysteryf

Liberated

abor and

Meyerhold's

History

f

Three

Internationals,

he atter nvolving,

n

FUl6p-Miller's

ccount,

200

cadetsfrom

he

cavalry

chool, 2300

soldiers,

ixteen

cannons,

five

irplanes

with

reflectors,

en

mounted reflectors,

rmored

trains,

rmored

cars,

motorcycles,

ield

hospitals,

etc.,notto mentionvariousmilitaryands and choruses."94The proletarian he-

aters

of

Erwin

Piscator and

Ernst

Toller,

also

well known n fascist

taly,

ould

also

be cited

in this

regard.)95

But,

however considerable

the direct mpact

of

Soviet

precedents

might

have

been,

t s essential o

emphasize

that he

"haunting"

of 18

BL is

more

than a

simple question

of influence.

The drama

isbuilt

upon

a

series

of

binary

oppositions

that

betray

imilarities

etweenfascism

nd

its

Bol-

shevik

win,

ven as

they ttempt

o institute ifferences.

Elided

by

this

binarism

is fascism's

rue

historical

nemesis,

iberal

democracy.)

The red strikers

arade,

fight,

nd

chant

chorusesjust

ike

their

lack-shirted

ounterparts.96

he metallic

howloftheirvoicesechoesthe mechanicalroarofthe fascists'rucks.Bothgroups

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are presented

as undifferentiatedollectives, nd

both

constitute

hemselves

n

a

choral dialogue with leader's mechanized

voice.

This said, t makesa substantial

ifference hether he voicein question con-

sists

of

a wind-up

barrel

organ playing

the

tune of Salome'sDance

of

the Seven

Veils, r instead ssues

forth rom living questrian tatue n the

form f metallic

orders.

What

I

mean is that while

the

detractors

f

18

BL

may

have been right

about

the work's Soviet

resonances, they

were

blind to the

contrast

it was

attempting

o

enforce

betweenfascist nd Bolshevik ttitudes owardmachinery.

For purposes of simplicity,

will erm his

distinction etweenmechanizationnd

metallizationeven though

t must

be noted

thatthedistinction s hardly bsolute,

due

to an increasing ultural nd political onvergencebetween

fascist taly and

StalinistRussia during

the

1930s).

Mechanization had been one

of the

driving

forcesbehind the Soviet revolutionary

heater.

t

was identified

with n effort o

strip he stage bare and disclose

ts most ntimateworkings. nstead of a factory

of seductivemythsnd illusions, heproletarian tagewould thereby ecomeboth

an instrument

orthe

demystification

f

contemporary ociety,

nd

a

place

where

alternate

futures ould be

staged

and

produced:

in

short, factory

n

which the

efficient

nteraction etween mechanized actor/workers, orking

machines, and

a

transparent

cenic

apparatus

would

exemplify

he

communist

ociety

of the

future. Since

the

actor-worker

epresented

the

ideal

citizen of

this

future

republic,contemporary

ramatists uch as Meyerhold ought to

transform

im

or

her

nto a

utopiansubject

dentical

o the

classless nd

sexless

economicsubject

the revolutionwas

attempting

o

forge.

nspired by theireconomistcolleagues,

theyfound in the motionefficiencytudiesof Taylor and othersa model for the

reduction of

"the work of acting" to a series of biomechanical

functions: a

machinelikediscipline

whose objectiveswere

economy, hythm, nd deliberate-

ness. This "mechanico-technological

econstruction

f man's daily life" was

viewed not as dehumanizingor deindividualizing

ut, on the contrary,s eman-

cipatory.

Mechanizationwas

the

means to a

utopian

end: the creation of

a

body

without

atigue the

robot)

and of

a society reed

from

he burden

of alienating

work

communism).

The creators

of 18 BL

were also

striving o shape a new societywithin nd

outside the confinesof the theater, nd for them, no less than the Soviets,the

production process

was ust as integral o therevolutionary pectacle

as the final

product. Yet,

committed

o

the fascist deal of an absolute theater

that would

collapse

the

boundaries between the real

and the ideal, theyviewed Soviet-style

mechanization s

the foe of a

theatrical imagination apable

of enveloping

facts

in

mystery."

he function f mass

theater s they onceived

it was

at

once

ritual

and

inaugural:

ritual" o the extent hat

by having actors

too

young

to

have

par-

ticipated

n

the March on Rome reenact the

battles

of theirfathers,

t

hoped

to

bridge

the

gap

betweenthe

pre-

and

post-revolutionary

enerations;

inaugural"

to the extent hatthe

spectacle

was

organized

n

such a way

as

to offer

preview

18BL 113

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of

a future

fully fascistized" ociety.Accordingly,

he production of 18 BL was

organized

along strictmilitary

ines.

The two thousand

actors,mostlymembers

of

the

GUF

and Fasci Giovanili although soldiers,Balilla, and Giovani

Italiane

participated),

were divided

into

armylikeunits,

each assigned a number

and

placed under the leadershipof a war veteran. And theirtraining s Thespians

was indistinguishable

rom

military raining.The director, unctioning

s a sur-

rogate Duce, oversawthese war

games as

if

a field

commander, inked by wiring

to the entire xpanse

of the stage:

In a central

abin

ontaining

network

f

elephone ontrols,ells, nd variegated

ignals,

the director"

ill,

ike

commander,ave

he

pectacle'sate irmly

n

hisgrip.

rom ime

to time,

epending

n

theunfolding

fthe

ction, ortions

fthe andscape r details n

the

tage

will

e

illuminated:

position,

communicationsrench, hilltop. he "vision"

will hus e

unbrokennd

synthetic.97

The authority, mniscience, nd ubiquitygranted

the directorby the

network f

cables was

not imited o the

stage. Strictly igurative

wires"oined him to the city

authorities,

he

military,

nd the

PNF,

all of

whom made a show

of

contributing

resources,manpower,

nd technical ssistance

n

order that "the vision"

be real-

ized

without

mpediment.98

And from the

start Blasetti had made

clear his

demands

for

absolute authority: Nothing

that have requested can

be dimin-

ished

in

scale

or

granted

without

full

cooperation....

The

execution

of

produc-

tion orders must

be

absolutely military,

which

is

to say

immediate,without

hesitation

or need for

discussion."99

eroic acts of the collectivewill

were the

order oftheday and, whether ctualor imagined,constituted spectacle n and

of themselves.

Rehearsals

carried

on

late

nto

the

night.

n

an ostentatious

isplay

of fascism's

evolt

gainst

the

ife

of

ease

and

comfort,

he

stage

and auditorium

were

completed

after

weeks of continuous

day

and

night

hifts

y

a

construction

crew

designed

to

embody

the deals

of

discipline,

lass

collaboration,

nd

national

mobilization.

imilar deals

extended

to the

audience, segments

f which

rrived

on

special

trains

nder the

aegis

of

the fascist

outh

nd after-work

rganizations.

Even

in the domain of

ticket ales there were

to be no

"inopportune

contradic-

tionsor

privileges."

8

BL would

inaugurate genuine

mass

art

form,

o

no

com-

plimentary icketswere distributed.'00 isibilitywould be comparable from all

sectors

of

the

auditorium

n

order

to

ensure that one

perspective

lone

would

emergeby

the

spectacle's

end: a unified ollectivevision ordered

and

organized

by

a

single

director/dictator.

Within he

setting

f this

ociety

n

a

state f

perpetual

mobilization,

machines

are

not

ust

tools

to

be

used

by

human

protagonists.

heir function s a

higher

one,

that

of

serving

s

idealized doubles

of

both

the collective nd

its

director/

commander.

I

employ

the word

"doubles"

because, contrary

o Soviet

practice,

two

parallel

dramatic

universes

coexist on

stage

in

18

BL: one human and one

mechanical-one involving he nterplay f menwith heir eaders; theotherthat

114

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of Mother Cartridge-Pouch

with

her

"chorus"

of fifty

rucks.Like

their

human

counterparts,

machines

are treated as

irreducibleentities

n 18 BL. They are

mechanical

"individuals"who

can

be

organized

into

larger

collectivegroupings

or totalities or placed

in

the

service

of

a

totality s prosthetic

evices), but who

cannot be broken downinto a series of interchangeable unctions r parts.This

principleof irreducibility ermits

ascistmachinery o take on human attributes

such

as

age, gender,will-power,

nd courage.

It

also

ensures that

ny mingling

f

man and

machine will assume

the formof "identification"nd not the

exchange

of

parts

or functions.Within his

economy

of

identification,

achines

stand for

an ideal:

not that

of

a

body

without

atigue

r of

a

society

without

lienation,

but

instead the distinctively

ascist deal

of

constant

exertion and fatigue coldly

resisted

.

.

in other

words,

"metallization."'0'

Metallization

s

a

paradoxicalconcept

whose

tentacles

xtend

deep

into con-

temporary

mass culture,

but whose crucial

mportance

o

fascism

willnow

limit

myself

o

sketching

ut

in

some finalremarks.

Unlike the sexless

stage

machines

of the Russiantheater,

he mechanical

hero of 18 BL

is

neither n emblem

of

an

atemporal utopia

nor a

specimen

of advanced

engineering.

She is

simply

a

mother truck: a

plain,

utilitarian

vehicle

destined

for

obsolescence,

a carrier

"pouch"

for

young

soldier-"cartridges"

hatwill

eventually

e used

up.

The

first

mass-produced

Fiat

truck,

he

embodies

the

fascist

masses,

even

when

singled

out with

respect

to the

other trucks.'02Her

mass

identity

s confirmed

by

two

further

igns:

her

gender-the

masses

were

always

feminized

n

contemporary

propaganda-and by

her

placement

under a relay

of

male governors xtending

fromCeseri to Blasetti o Mussolini. But iffeminized,whythenshould she be a

mother?

A

clue

is provided by the

sole other

female presence

in

18

BL:

Salome.

Temptress and

decapitator

n

Oscar Wilde's play and

Richard Strauss's opera,

Salome

is

conjured

up

in

order to

forge

a

symbolic

ink

between

the

menace

of

decadent

sensuality

nd Marxian materialism.'03

er

dance,

garbled

and

paro-

died

by

barrel

organ,

becomes a

strip-tease

kin

to the

denuding

of Soviet

tage

with ts

false

promises

f a

techno-mechanical

topia. Against

uch seductive

llu-

sions

imported

from

England,

Germany, nd Austria-indeed against sexuality

as such-18

BL elaborates the chaste

metallic ountermyth

f the Latin mother

truck: an

autocarro tipo normale

whose norm is heroic service, dedication, and

incessant

work. Able to bear the feverish

xploitsof 1917, 1922, and 1932 with

icy coolness,

she succumbs

n

the end only to be transfigured nto a symbolof

national sacrifice.

ike her

figurative

sons," hesoldiers ofWorld War

I

and the

March

on

Rome,

Mother

Cartridge-Pouch

ays down her body

in a finalgesture

of

self-offering

hat iterally aves

the

way

to

futureglory.

18

BL thus ends on

something

f an

elegiac note. The vehicle thathad come

to

personify ascism's

esistance o

fatigue

ubmits o nature's ron aw

of

degen-

eration

over time

via

an act of

fruitful

acrifice.And

thisat the culminating

momentofa work nwhose tableauxthepromise of a transfigured ational col-

18BL

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lectivitys

always

hadowed

by

the

menace ofdissolution nd loss.

Fascismnever

ceased

reflecting pon

decline,

whethern

the domain of

the

body

or the

history

of

peoples. Having

little aith n

the

ability

f

science

or

technology

o

decisively

alter humankind's

emporal

predicament,

ecular and

anticlerical t its

origins,

the

movement ried to

practice

what t

called

"realism," skeptical nti-idealist

turn of mind with ties to Bergsonianphenomenology.This said, itwas deeply

fearful

hat

realism"

ould

lead

back

to a

sense of sadness

and

fatigue,

n

short,

back to the ethos

of

decadentism nd materialism

hat

the revolution laimed to

have overthrown.

National

skepticism,

melancholy,

nd

mourning

were

symp-

tomsof the iberal-democratic/socialist

aralysis

hathad

preceded the March on

Rome, and against them fascism

reached a gospel of

constant ctivity,heerful

self-creation,

nd

eternal

youth,

ven

going

o

far s to

nvent ecular

otherworlds

forthe

preservation

f

ts

martyrs.

t

was

in

this

pirit

hat n

early

versionof

the

.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

FIGURE 8 (left).Xanti

Schawinsky,1934-XI I,"

poster;Annitrenta:

Arte cultura n talia

Milan,

1983),

487.

FIGURE 9

(right).

R.

Bertelli,Continuousrofile

fMussolini, ood,

early

1930s. Photo:

collection f

Paul Sullivan.

116

REPRESENTATIONS

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script

or 18

BL had proposed

thatMotherCartridge-Pouch

e resurrected

fter

three

days of

burial.

But

in the

finalversionofthe spectacle,

he perils

of ending

on

an

elegiac

note were evaded by means

ofa less

batheticdevice:

a

swift hift

n

focus away

from

the burial scene toward

fascism'spresent

achievements

and

future romise.The mother ruckmayhave passed away, apitulating o the nex-

orable reality

f

aging,

but

fascism

s

always

lready

on the move

and the deal of

metallization

he

once embodied

has

been fully ransposed

nto the

human realm

by

iDuce.

The

viewers f

18 BL

did not need

to have this

final ransposition

xplained

to them.

The most

fleeting llusions

would

do. A metallic

voice heard over

oud-

speakers,

n equestrian

profile,

nd a slogan or

twowere enough

to nsinuate

hat

Mussolini

was the

spectacle's

secret

protagonist.'04

uch economy

of means was

possible

because by

the

mid 1930s fascism

had

begun

to fill ts deological

voids

with totalitarian

ult.

This was not

a traditional ult

of

personality

utrather

modernist ultof the dictator'smetallizedbodyas missile, s axe, as man of the

crowd,

as

hero with

a thousand faces,

as helmet,

s mask, as

head with

a 360-

degree

gaze (figs.

8 and

9).

In

this vast

proliferation

f

images,

fascist

rtists

decomposed

and

recomposed

fascism's

mostoriginal

though

paradoxical

crea-

tion: the

myth

f an individual

who

could stand at the center

of a

reconstructed

universe;

a

being,

at once

hyperphallic

nd

hyperchaste,

who

might

reconcile

man with

machine,

ndividualwith

mass,

matter

with

pirit;

deus x machina

or

the

gigantic

heater f

modern revolution.

Notes

I wish o acknowledge

he support

of the National Humanities

Center and the Simon

Guggenheim

Memorial

Foundation during the

time that this essay was

written.

would also

liketo thankMary

Hunter and Donald Raleigh

for heir

help with, espec-

tively, he

musicological

nd Slavic portions

f this ssay's rgument; nd,

especially,

Mara Blasetti for her

making available to

me the manuscript

materials

nd photo-

graphs in

her collection. All future

references

o documents

held in the Blasetti

archive re

designated with

he nitialsBA.

1. ScottNearing,Fascism New York,n.d.),58.

2.

"La finedi un

regno,"

Criticafascista,

no. 18

(15

September 1931):

343.

3. Bruno Spampanato,

"La rivoluzione del

popolo," Critica

ascista 10, no. 21 (1

November 1932):

403.

4. Quoted fromLynnMally,

ulture f

he uture: he

roletkult

ovement

n Revolutionary

Russia

Berkeley,

990), 125.

5. Cited

n

KonstantinRudnitsky,

ussian

nd Soviet heater: 905-1932, trans.

Roxanne

Perman,

ed. Lesley

Milne

New

York, 1988),

41.

6.

Platon

Kerzhentsev,

reative

heater;

ited n

ibid.,

45.

7.

Jeffreychnapp,

"Epic

Demonstrations:The 1932

Exhibition

f the FascistRevolu-

tion,"

n

Fascism, esthetics,

nd

Politics,

d.

R.l. Golsan

(Hanover, N.H.,

1992), 3; but

18BL

117

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see

also Barbara

Spackman,

"The FascistRhetoric f Virility."

tanfordtalianReview

8, nos. 1-2 (1990):

81-102.

8. The phrase

"eclettismo

ello

spirito" s from

Mussolini's naugural speech

for the

Italian Academy on 28

October

1929.

On this subject see

Giuseppe Carlo Marino,

L'autarchia

ella cultura Rome, 1983), 3-17.

9. Passingreferences o 18 BL may be found in Emanuela Scarpellini,Organizzazione

teatrale politica el

teatro

ell'Italiafascista

Florence, 1989), 238-40; Adriano AprA's

introduction

o Alessandro lasetti: crittiul

cinema Venice, 1982), 31; Giovanni

Laz-

zari,

Littoriali

elta

ultura

dell'arte

Naples, 1979), 22-23;

Enzo Maurri,Rose carlatte

e

telefoni

ianchi

Rome,

1981), 77-78;

and Mario Verdone, "Spettacolo politicoe 18

BL,"

in

Futurismo,

ultura,

politica,

d. Renzo De Felice

Turin,

1988), 483-84.

10. Due perhaps

to his own affinities

ith

ascism,

Georges Bataille's theorization

s often

stronger

han

that

f the Frankfurtchool. As a point

of

entry ee "The Psychological

Structure

f

Fascism,"

n

Visions

f

xcess:

electedWritings,

927-1939, ed. Alan Stoekl

(Minneapolis,

1985), 137-60.

11.

I

have in mind a research

agenda not unlike thatwhich nforms

he work

of Diane

GhirardoRuth Ben-Ghiat'sTheFormationf Fascist ulture: heRealistMovementn

Italy, 930-1943

(Ph.D. diss.,

Brandeis University, 991); and, across the

Atlantic,

Pier Giorgio

Zunino's L'ideolog'a

elfascismo:

iti

credenze valorinella

stabilizzazione

del

regime

Bologna, 1985);

PietroCavallo's mmaginariorappresentazione:

l teatrofas-

cista

i

propaganda

Rome, 1990);

and Klaus

Theweleit's

psychoanalytic

tudy

f Frei-

korps

fficers,

ale Fantasies

Minneapolis,

1987-89).

12.

These

plays,

entitledCampo

di

maggio 1930), Villafranca1931),

and Cesare

1939),

are

reprinted

n

Giovacchino

Forzano,

Mussolini,

utore

rammatico

Florence,

1954).

De

Felice comments:

"There can be no doubt that .. the three historicaldramas

resulting

rom

Mussolini's

ollaboration

withForzano bear

witness o Mussolini's

en-

dency

to projectively

dentify

imself nd his

actionswith

history's olitaryman who

is conscious not onlyofhisgreatmissionbutalso ofhaving to accomplish t amidst

the

ncomprehension

nd moral

nadequacy

of those who surround

him

and

ought

to

have been

of

assistance;

conscious also of

having

to

act

by capitalizing

on and

exploiting veryopportunity

n a more dramaticrace event

even than

that

against

death: the

race

against

cyclical ecursion"';

Mussolini

l

duce,

vol.

,

Gli

anni

del con-

senso,

929-1936

(Turin, 1974),

32.

13.

On

at least

one

occasion,

Mussolini

ven found the

timeto

make

suggestions

or

the

revision

f a dramatic

text: the

tragedy imma, y

Francesco

Pastonchi,

o whom he

offered

he

thought borrowed

fromAnatole

France):

"Caress

your

sentence:

she

will

nd

up smiling

ack at

you";

cited

n

Opera

mnia

i Benito

Mussolini,

ds. Edoardo

Susmel

and Duilio Susmel

(Rome, 1978),

42:92.

14. On theCorporazionedello Spettacolo'shistoryee Scarpellini,Organizzazioneeatrale,

131-64.

The

government's

ias

toward

regulation

f theater

producers

and not

the

content

of their

work has

been examined

by

Mabel

Berezin,

"The

Organization

of

Political deology: Culture, State,

and Theater

in

Fascist

taly,"

American

ociological

Review

6

(October 1991):

639-5

1.

15.

The best source

on the

history

nd

teachings

f

the Filodrammatiche

s

l

teatrofilo-

drammatico

Rome, 1929),

edited

by

the "Ufficio ducazione

Artistica ella

Direzione

Centrale

dell'OND,"

but

argely

uthored

by

Antonio

Valente.

16.

The

philodramatic

elebrations

f

political

nniversaries

were

particularly

riticized

by

the

advocates

of a modernist ascist heater.

A

case

in

point

s

Augusto

Consorti:

"These re-evocations

which

can

hardly

be referredto as

'representations')

ught

to be harmonizedwiththe same criteriathathave guided the organizersof the

118

REPRESENTATIONS

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Exhibition

of the Revolution";

Rievocazione,"

L'Italia vivente

, no. 18 (28

October

1933):

9.

17.

O.N.D.,

Il

teatrofilodrammatico,

01, 99,

107.

18. All the

cited

figures re from carpellini,Organizzazione

eatrale,

49.

19. The repertory

f the Carri di

Tespi

is

furnished

y Scarpellini,

bid., 365-69.

20. Carlo Lari, "I Carri diTespi,"Comoedia 5,no. 7 (15 July-15August1933): 36; Paolo

Orano,

I

Carri

di

Tespi

ell'O.N.D. Rome,

1937),

17.

21.

A

complete

technical

verview f the Thespian

cars s

found n Carro

i

Tespi,

pam-

phlet published

by the Opera

Nazionale Dopolavoro

in 1936. Also worth

onsulting

are

Mario Corsi,

i teatroll'aperto

n talia (Milan, 1939),

263-88;

and Orano,

I Carri

di Tespi.

22.

Giovanni

sgr6,

Fortuny

ii

teatro

n.p., 1986),

107.

23.

Orano,

I Carridi Tespi,

9.

24.

On the science of work

ee Anson Rabinbach,

TheHuman

Motor:

nergy, atigue,

nd

the

Origins

fModernity

New

York, 1990).

25. Orano,

I Carridi

Tespi,

9-20.

26. C[orrado] P[uccetti]n "I Carri diTespi,"Gente ostra,nos. 47/48 13-26 September

1937):

7; Orano, Carri

di Tespi,

6.

27.

Ibid.

28.

As noted

earlier, pen-air spectacles

were

hardly

nvented

by

fascism.Following

he

lead

of theorists

uch as Edward

Gordon

Craig

and Sheldon

Cheney,

Ettore

Roma-

gnoli

had, for nstance,

evived he

Greek theaterof

Siracusa

earlier

n

the century.

But it

was under fascism

hatopen-air

theater eceived

a full

consecration nd

gov-

ernmental upport

on

which

ubject

ee Corsi,

l

teatro ll'aperto

n

talia).

29.

Scarpellini,

Organizzazione

eatrale,

7.

30.

Cited

in

ibid.,

149.

31. SIAE speech, Rome, 28

April 1933;

Mussolini,Opera

omnia,

4:5

1.

32. Ibid., 44:50.

33.

F. M.

Marinetti,

Fondazione

e

manifesto

el Futurismo,"

eoria invenzionefuturista,

ed. Luciano

De Maria (Milan, 1983),

11.

34.

On

Pavolini's

areer and

biography

ee

Arrigo

Petacco,Pavolini:

'ultima affica

i Sal6

(Milan, 1982);

and Marco

Palla, Firenzenel

regime ascista,

929-1934

(Florence,

1978),

171-230.

35.

On

the Littoriali

ee

Ugoberto

Alfassio

and Marina Addis Saba,

Cultura passo

romano: toria

strategie

ei

Littoriali

eltacultura dell'arte

Milan, 1983);

Giovanni

Lazzari,

I

Littoriali

ella cultura

dell'arte

Naples,

1979); and Ruggero

Zangrandi, l

lungoviaggio

ttraverso

lfascismo:

ontributo

lla storia i

una

generazione

Milan, 1962),

esp.

381-87.

36. Cited frompage 9 of a letter ddressed to Mussoliniby Achille Starace,dated 19

March 1935,

and written

n

response

to a proposal by

Cesare Maria De

Vecchi,Min-

ister f Public Instruction,

hat he GUF and Littoriali

e placed under

the supervi-

sion of his ministry;

enito Mussolini, personal

papers, microfilm

15, reel 230

#1222B,

University f Chicago

Library.

37. Starace to

Mussolini,

19 March

1935,

p. 4;

in

ibid.

38.

Pavolini,

Fascisti

iovani

l

lavoro,"

l

bargello,

April 1934,

1.

39.

Ibid.

40. Valentino

Bompiani,

"Invito ditoriale l romanzo collettivo,"'

Gazzetta

elpopolo, 4

March

1934,

3. On fascist ealism

ee Ben-Ghiat,

ormationf ascist

ulture, 85-229.

41.

Berta,

son

of

the owner of the

Berta foundries,

was slain for

appearing in

a black

shirt efore thepopulationof San Frediano Florence'smain proletarianneighbor-

18BL 119

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hood) right

fter he

fascists'

murder

of the

communist eader Spartaco

Lavagnini.

Immortalized s

a "martyr

f

the revolution"

n fascist ong, Berta would

stillfigure

in the central

episode

of act

2 of

18 BL, in which a commemoration

of the fascist

dead is

accompanied by

the

singing

f "Hanno ammazzato

GiovanniBerta,"

ballad

promising

aith

n

Mussolini nd the

defeat of Lenin.

42. The source for his dea mayhave been "II vecchio amion"byLeo Bomba, published

in the midst

of

L'Italia vivente's

ampaign

for revolutionary

ascist heater.Bomba,

a fascist squadrist, had fondly

recalled and, indeed,

humanized the squadrons'

trucks:

It's

impossible

to

disentangle

the memory

of days past from that fast

and

noisy carcass

which

we never viewed merely

s a means of transportation";

'Italia

vivente ,

no. 18

(28

October

1933):

6-7.

43.

See,

for

nstance,

Mario

Sironi's

ollages

TheYellow ruck1919)

and

Urban

andscape

with

ruck

1920-23).

44. Corrado

Sofia describes

the

compositional

process

n

"II parere

di

uno degli

autori:

TRADIMENTO ,"

Quadrivio,

May 1934, 3.

In

his tirade

against collective uthor-

ship, Sofia subsequently

laims

that he

produced

a full screenplayof his own,

even

thoughthescript reserved n theBA contains nlyfive f the nine tableaux referred

to

in

its title 8

BL: Mistero

n

9

quadri.

45.

Many decades

later,Blasetti

would assertthat Mussolini

had personally hosen

him

to

direct he spectacle: "[Mussolini]

magined show for

crowdof 20,000 spectators

and he

wanted me to

direct t. made a show called

18 BL,

the name of

a

truck....

It was the

biggest

fiasco

n

the

history

f international heater.This was ... the only

time

Blasettireceived

the

congratulations

f Mussolini....

He said: 'This has dem-

onstrated

power

of

initiative,

f

force,

of

resistance,

f steadfastness.

xtraordi-

nary"';

cited

in Elaine

Mancini,

Struggles f

the talian Film ndustry uring

Fascism,

1930-35 (Ann

Arbor,

Mich., 1985),

113. Archival

records ndicate,

on the contrary,

that t

was Pavolini

who

organized

18 BL and made the

keypersonnel

decisions.

46. The scripts reserved n BA are thoseof De Feo, Lisi,Melani, Sofia, nd Venturini-

the atter

wo

serving

s Blasetti's

main sources.

The

degree

to which

Blasetti ook t

upon

himself

o introduce

lements

fromhis

prior

films

nto the final

creenplay

s

hard

to

determine.

n

any event,

he

key

modifications f

the various

scripts

esulted

from

he

practicalities

f

staging

18

BL.

47.

The

quotation

s from

AlbertoBoero's

first

creenplay,

ited

fromSole:

Soggetto,

ce-

neggiatura,

ote

per

la

realizzazione,

d.

Adriano

AprA

and

Riccardo Redi

(Rome,

1985), 27.

48. Two

recent

English

discussions

of 1860

are

Angela

Dalle Vacche's

in The

Body

n the

Mirror:

hapes

fHistory

n talian Cinema

Princeton,N.J.,

1992),

96-120;

and Marcia

Landy's

Fascism

n Film: The

talian Commercial

inema,

931-1943

(Princeton,N.J.,

1986), 183-87.

49. As Pavolini

describes

t,

the

enterprise

was carried out

with

city

nd

military elp;

"Fascisti

giovani

l

lavoro,"

1.

50.

Giuseppe Isani,

"Nascita

d'uno

spettacolo,"

'Italia

etteraria,

8 March

1934,

4.

51. Cipriano Giachetti,

II

teatro i

Littoriali i

Firenze,"

Comoedia

6,

no. 6

(June

1934):

8.

52.

Ruggero Orlando,

"Che

cos'e

18

BL,"'

La

tribuna,

0

April

1934,

3.

53.

Blasetti,

Primeconsiderazioni

proposte,"

ypescript,

arch

1934,

BA.

54.

From an

anonymous article,

Per lo

spettacolo

di

masse,"

l

bargello,

March

1934,

3. Much of

the

post-performance

olemic

would

hinge

on the links

to Eisenstein:

"Blasetti

wanted all

the

figures

o

be

profiled

gainst

the

sky,

hat

is,

in

his usual

manner,he imposed thecinematographicmannerism fviewing hingsfromdown

120

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below a la

Eisenstein

.. treating

he

spectators

ike the geese

that nspired Eisen-

stein'spasse

cinematic tyle";

ofia,

II

parere di uno

degli

otto

autori,"

7.

55. Isani, "Nascita d'uno spettacolodi masse,"

4.

56. In an unsigned

articlepublished

before the spectacle, Sofia

had already expressed

reservations:

The impactof suchan innovation n theatrical nd musical practices shard

to foresee.

Given

the

exceptionally

arge

number

of

spectators,

Corrado

Sofia, one

of

the

creators

of the mystery lay,'

had wished instead

to

nor-

malize

the highlighted

voices;

several newspaperboys

would have

com-

mented upon

the action as if the chorus

n an ancient Greek play; events

of

capital

mportancewould

have been

announced bymeans

of a town

rier;

n

the most allegorical

and

stylized

cenes-the

parliamentary

anquet,

for

example-the

banqueters

would

have

employed

megaphones

to communi-

cate with

the

spectators....

The director

decided instead to transmit

ven

the choruses

over

loudspeakers

by

means of

records, hoping

to achieve

an

emotive

force

equivalent

to that

possessed

by

ive voices and songs:

an

aim

which,

f

successfully ttained,

willconstitute

notable

precedent.

"Nel clima

dei

giovani,"

i

lavorofascista,

8 April 1932,

3.

57. Blasetti,

Primeconsiderazioni

proposte:

Parte sonora,"2,

BA.

58.

Isani,

"Nascita

d'uno

spettacolo

di

masse,"

4.

59.

Sergio Codelupi,

"Un teatro

per

ventimila

persone

a

Firenze,"

i

telegrafo, April

1934,

7.

60.

"B.

F.," "Esperimento

di

teatro

per

ventimila

persone,"

Corriere

ella

sera, 20 April

1934, 3.

61. General

audience

tickets ost

3

lire;

reserved

seating

tickets ost

10,

25,

or 50

lire.

No

free tickets

were

distributed,

nd the

only

discount

vailable was for

dopolavoristi,

who could purchase

10 lire seats for

only

8

lire.

62. Records concerning he makeup ofthe audience are lacking.Press reportsnotethe

presence

of

Florentine ity

eaders as

well

as Renato

Ricci,

Giacomo Paulucci

di Cal-

boli,

and Arturo

Marpicati.

A

note fromPavolini o Blasetti

had

promised

thatEdda

Mussolini

would

accompany

her husband Galeazzo

Ciano to the

performance.

63.

Original plans

were for

double boat

bridge,

s indicated

n Mannucci and Tempes-

tini's

drawings

and

in

documents contained

in

the BA;

Blasetti to Giovanni

Poli,

protocol

#39, p.

1.

The dearth

of boats ensured

the adoption of a

single bridge

solution.

64.

Cipriano Giachetti,

La

rappresentazione

del '18

BL'

ha luogo stasera,"

La nazione,

29-30

April 1934,

5.

65. Raffaello

Franchi,

18

BL

spettacolo

di masse,"L'Italia etteraria,

May

1934, 1.

66. The firstmovement fSquilli danze er l18 BL is designatedas a solenne,onsisting

in

a series of trumpet

alls accompanied by

tam tams and slow

drumming.Massar-

ani's score was

published

n

1937

by

Edizioni

G.

Ricordi

n

Milan.

67.

In

the

original

script

published

in

Gioventitascista)

nd

in

draftspreserved

n the

BA

the

truckwas named Mamma Gloria

nd not Mamma Giberna. ometime

n late

March, Blasetti

musthave decided to shift o the atter

name.

68.

The

original

plan

was for two

air

squadrons to overfly

he crowd. For reasons

that

may

have to do with he one-week

postponement

f the performance

due to rain),

these two

squadrons

were reduced either

to several

airplanes

or to a single

one.

Blasetti'snotes

read as

follows:

The airplanes, riss-crossed

ythe multicolor eams

of the

photoelectric

rojectors,

will scatter

broadsheets

fromthe Popolo

d'Italia

...

for a giventime, fterwhichtheywillrapidlydepart toward the left nd right ides

18BL 121

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95. For a comparative

tudy

f mass theater n

Soviet Russia, the

WeimarRepublic, and

Nazi Germany,

ee

Hannelore Wolff,Volksabstimmung

uf der Bithne?:

Das Massen-

theaterls Mittel olitischer

gitationFrankfurt,

985).

96.

This doubling

extends even to the

spectacle's

ongs. "Hanno

ammazzato Giovanni

Berta,"for

nstance,

would

have

been familiar

o the audience

of 18 BL in both black

and red flavors.n thesoundtrack tsfirst erseswere:

They

have killed Giovanni

Berta

a fascist mong

fascists,

revenge,

yes,revenge

shall befallthe communists.

In the

communist

ersion t would have opened:

They have

killed

Giovanni

Berta

son of a

war

profiteer:

long live the communist

who

stomped

on his hands.

Cited fromCantidell'Italiafascista,919-1945, ed. A. V. Savona and M. L. Straniero

(89-90).

Such doublings

are

endemic: "The fascist epertory

istinguishes tself

ar

less

than t would have

liked from he

contemporaneous

ntifascist

nd democratic

repertory.ndeed,

it often

dopts

the

same tonalities

nd the same linguistic

liches,

and

on occasion

even had recourse

to

the same

songs,

whichunderwent nly

minimal

modification"5).

97. Yambo,

"Fervida preparazione

dei Littoriali,"

3

April

1934,

1.

98.

Since Florentine

municipal

records for this

period

are

incomplete,

t is difficult

o

establish

he

precise

contribution

made

by city

uthorities.

he Azienda Autonoma

di

Turismo

di

Firenze contributed

t

east 100,000

lire to the budget

of the Littoriali,

according

o documents

found

n

Florence's

Archivio

di

Storia.The

Comune of Flor-

ence also coveredthe electricalbill at the Parterre an Gallo, and allocated 35,000

lire for

"the

preparation

of some

segments

f

Argin

Grosso, Mortuli,

nd Isolotto

streets"

quoted

from

document,

dated

2

March

1934, signed

by

the

Podesta'

Paolo

Pesciolini,

Archiviodi

Storia,

Florence

Prefecture,

General

Affairs,

eries

2, 1934,

file

87,

envelope 2202).

99. Cited from

Prime considerazioni

proposte:

Ufficio,"

A.

100. Orlando,

"Prove

di

18

BL," 3.

101. The

metaphor

of "metallization,"

entralto Marinetti's

writings,

s

cited

in

the

epi-

logue

to

Walter

Benjamin's

"The Work

of Art

n

the

Age

of Mechanical

Reproduc-

tion": "War

s beautiful

because

it nitiates he dreamt-of

metallization

f the human

body"; lluminations,

d.

Hannah

Arendt,

rans.

Harry

Zohn

(New

York,

1976),

241.

The metaphoralso figuresprominentlyn thewritings xamined byTheweleit in

Male

Fantasies nd

in

works uch as

Ernst

Junger's

n

Stahlgewittern

aus

dem

Tagebuch

eines

tosstruppfihrers)Berlin,

1931).

102.

One

contemporary ress

account

presents

the 18

BL as the

founding

ancestor

of

Italian

mass

transportation;

[urio] M[ortari],

Teatro

di

masse:

Lo

spettacolo

di

stasera

a

Firenze,"

a

stampa,

9

April 1934,

4.

103.

Salome

is

identified

with the so-called

donna crisi

o

be

contrasted

with the donna

madre/truck,

n which

ubject

ee Victoriade

Grazia,

How Fascism

uled Women:

taly,

1922-1945 (Berkeley,

1992), 212-13.

De

Grazia

notes:

"To

respond

to

the

aesthetic

mayhem

unleashed

by

commercial

culture,

the fascist

propaganda

machine,

with

124 REPRESENTATIONS

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