This theatre, located a short distance from the city centre, is the result of the renovation of a 1947 building that was part of the even older Fabbricone factory (1888), the nerve centre of the Prato textile economy. Currently the Fabbricone is one of the four halls of the Metastasio Theatre Foundation. The other three are the Metastasio Theatre, the Fabbrichino and the Magnolfi Theatre (a small treasure with 99 seats, in a former convent residence). The Fabbricone debuted as an innovative theatre in 1974 with Orestea, directed by Luca Ronconi, in the context of the Prato Workshop, which marked the beginning of a stage experience that established an alternative to traditional Italian theatre, an experiment that still has something to teach us today - forty years later. Through the years, research, experimentation and the most classic modernity have been the features of the theatre’s seasonal programming policy and they have made the Fabbricone a national and international point of reference of theatrical renewal.
It has staged many productions of great significance. In addition to the works directed by the above-mentioned Ronconi, there have been productions staged by Carlo Lizzani, Massimo Castri, Peter Brook, Andrzej Wajda, Tadeusz Kantor, Otomar Krejca, Anatoli Vasil’ev and Thierry Salmon. In 2000 it was decided to undertake renovations - to the design by the engineer Francesco Stopaccioli - intended to make clearly visible, through the reconstruction of the industrial environment, the connection with the building’s, and therefore Prato’s, manufacturing origins.
For more information:
www.metastasio.it/it/informazioni/fabbricone