The Mountain Giants

A long-awaited theatrical and literary event; this posthumously published and unfinished play has been provided with the missing final scene by Charles Wood. The action takes place in the fantastic Villa Scalogna, inhabited by a grotesque group of people led by Cotrone, a wizard and illusionist. Into this scene comes a band of actors, about to perform one of Pirandello's own plays. The Mountain Giants was first produced at the National Theatre in the summer of 1993. Pirandello's prolific writing career was unusual in that he had already earned a considerable reputation as a poet and prose author before turning to the theatre relatively late in life. The premiere of Six Characters in Search of an Author in 1921 established him internationally as Italy's leading playwright.