Accidental Death of an Anarchist (ADA)
Accidental Death of an Anarchist is a play written by Dario Fo in 1970. On the 12th of December 1969, a bomb exploded in the headquarters of the National Agrarian Bank in Piazza Fontana, Milan, Italy. The Bomb killed 17 people and injured 88. In the same afternoon 3 more bombs exploded and 1 was discovered unexploded. The police immediately announced that the terrorist attacks were caused by a group of anarchists and made 80 arrests including that of a local man, Guiseppe Pinelli...
The play was written in response to a trial that was on at the time, 3 policemen were being accused of murdering Guiseppe Pinelli. Pinelli was a railway worker (like Dario Fo's father) and was politically active in the anarchist movement. Three days after his arrest on the 15th of December 1969, he fell from a window on the fourth floor of the Milan Police station. The evidence of the incident appeared to make no sense and after a time the official verdict was that he had jumped from the window.
Many years later, it was discovered that the anarchists were not responsible and Pinelli was innocent od the crime. The group that was actually to blame were a neo-facist group called 'Ordine Nouvo' (Italian for new order).
Dario Fo:
Dario Fo was born on 24 March 1926 in San Giano, a small town on Lago Maggiore in the province of Varese. His family consisted of: His father, Felice Fo, a station master, socialist and actor in an amatuer theatre company; his mother, Pina Rota, "a woman of great imagination"; a brother and a sister.
However, Dario Fo's passion for storytelling really blossomed during the time spent with his grandfather when they would travel around the countryside selling his produce from a horse-drawn wagon. In order to attract customers his grandfather would tell the most amazing stories, in these stories he would include anecdotes of local events. It was from these stories that Dario learnt the basics of narration.
Accidental Death of an Anarchist:
The play follows a characters called the Maniac who is secretly a reporter trying to find out what really happened to the anarchist who mysteriously 'fell out of a window accidentally'. As the plot plays out we see the truth more obviously that the police officers (mainly Pissani and the superintendent) pressured the railway worker to suicide through a series of lies they had no evidence for. They proceeded to attempt to cover this up with other versions of the story diverting the blame. We see just how uncoordinated the police department is and how stupid the officers are. A lot of the play is funny moments where the audience will laugh at the police officers stupidity however once the laughter subsides the audience is left to think about what they have watched and they realise the message Dario Fo wanted to create. He successfully portrayed the police incompetence through their stupid interactions. Furthermore, abuse of power is shown in the master servant relationship of the constable and Bertozzo.
NobelPrize.org. (n.d.). The Nobel Prize in Literature 1997. [online] Available at: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1997/fo/biographical/.