Bright Azzurro Sea a short film/digital play premiered at the Mercury Online Festival August 2020

Bright Azzuro Sea is a short digital play written and created in response to Covid-19 lockdown, providing a glimpse in the lives of an Italian mother and her three daughters, who live in the UK. The three daughters, who are all in different locations in UK, are talking over a digital interface and as usual there is a lot of bickering especially between the eldest and the youngest… The mother joins in. Her hair is wet, she has a bad sunburn and talks from her car, defying Italian total lockdown rules. The daughters are worried about her, but Maria-Teresa, the middle daughter has a secret of her own. With humour and a bit of drama, this play explores family relations during the lockdown, while touching upon themes of freedom, isolation, migration, and Italian diaspora. The sharp dialogues and the brief interludes of dramatic displays are entertaining as well as thought-provoking and invite for a collective reflection on the resilience and the challenges presented by the current pandemic, especially as experienced by women and those living apart, and in different countries. This piece has been produced totally remotely with all cast and crew working from different locations in the UK and in Italy, and the footage has been recorded on mobile devices.