A performance at the 25th International Puppet Theatre Festival in San Giacomo di Roburent, in the Piedmont region of northern Italy, precedes scheduled appearances in Amsterdam, Netherlands, on August 17, and in Bratislava, Slovakia, on September 6, before returning to Portuguese stages for É Só Palheta – Encontro de Teatro Tradicional Dom Roberto, in Agualva-Cacém, from September 12 to 14, and at the Porto International Puppet Festival in October, according to the company’s calendar available on its website.
According to S.A. Marionetas, “the ‘Teatro Dom Roberto’ is undoubtedly one of the oldest traditions of performing arts, not just in its Portuguese and European aspect, but also among the popular heroes of the East.”
The Alcobaça-based company traces the origins of this popular art form, regarding Europe, to the 16th-century Italian Commedia dell’ Arte, acknowledging the possibility that Eastern traditions have “in some way, influenced the evolution of this type” of expression.
The recreation of the ‘Teatro Dom Roberto’ model by S.A. Marionetas is associated with the “privilege [of having] direct contact with master António Dias, one of the last popular puppet masters in Portugal,” as recalled in the statement released today.
From that contact and the collected testimonies, the company was able to recreate two ‘Robertos’ shows: ‘O Barbeiro’ and ‘A Tourada.’
More recently, “aiming to preserve this form of traditional art,” the company revived three more plays from the Teatro de Robertos repertoire: ‘A Rosa e os 3 Namorados,’ ‘O Castelo dos Fantasmas,’ and ‘O Saloio de Alcobaça.’
This collection work by S.A. Marionetas, in the realm of puppet theatre, has been awarded by international festivals in the Czech Republic (2021), Ukraine (2017), Thailand (2014), and Indonesia (2013), and was also recognized for its contribution to the “preservation and continuity of European puppet theatre” by the 14th World Festival of Puppet Art in Prague in 2010.
The aim of S.A. Marionetas is “not to let the theatre of Robertos, as a Portuguese cultural heritage, disappear.”
The Teatro Dom Roberto has been registered in the National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage since 2021.
