Life is an inverted circus: Grupo Galpão’s Romeu e Julieta adapted from pennafort’s translation of Shakespeare’s

Abstract

Among the various manifestations of late modernism occurring in Brazil is Grupo Galpão, a street theatre company founded in 1982. Combining elements of circus, the improvisation of commedia dell´arte, the exuberant creativity of classic and Renaissance dramaturgy, and the vanguard movement of contemporary theatre with the production of the regional-cultural imagination inscribed in the Brazilian performative code, the members of this group represent a new generation of directors and actors whose work, as it reveals Brazil as an apparently not serious carnavalesque nation, also challenges the public to reflect on present and past concerns.