We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!

by Dario Fo

THE LITERARY WORK

A farce set in 1970s Italy; first performed in Italian (as Non si paga! Nan st paga!) in Milan in 1974, to English in Great Britain in 1978.

SYNOPSIS

A working-class housewife combats Italy’s astronomical cost of living by Joining other frustrated women in looting the local market.

Events in History at the Time of the Play

The Play in Focus

For More Information

Playwright, actor, political activist, and Nobel laureate, Dario Fo (1926-present) distinguished himself in the latter twentieth century as one of Italy’s most renowned and iconoclastic playwrights. Fo was born in San Giano in the northern part of Lombardy to Felice Fo, a railroad employee, and Pina Rota, the daughter of a peasant family that labored in northern Italy’s rice paddies. In 1940, the Fos decided to send their intellectually promising son to study art at the Liceo Brera (Brera High School), part of the famed Accademia Brera (Brera Academy) in Milan. Although the Second World War temporarily interrupted his studies, Fo finally enrolled in the Accademia Brera and the Istituto Politecnico (Polytechnical Institute), where he studied art and architecture, respectively. In 1949 Fo abandoned formal study to concentrate on the stage, which led to his performing a series of monologues entitled Poer Nano (Poor Lad) at the Odeon Theater in Milan in 1952. Two years later he married the actress Franca Rame, and in 1958 the two founded their own theater company, La Campagnia Fo-Rame (The Fo-Rame Company). This move launched the first phase of Fo’s career, dubbed by most critics as “the bourgeois period.” During this phase (1959-68), Fo wrote such noteworthy plays as Archangels Don’t Play Pinball (Gli arcangeli non giocano a flipper, 1959), He Had Two Pistols and White and Black Eyes (Aveva due pistole con gli occhi bianchi e neri) 1960), and Isabella Three Caravels and a Con-Man (Isabella, tre caravelle e un cacciballe, 1963). The year 1968 marked the beginning of Fo’s next or “revolutionary phase,” in which he started to write and perform theater for a working-class audience. To this period belong several of his most well-known works: Funny Mystery (Mistero Buffo, 1969), Tie Me Up and I’ll Still Smash Everything (Legami pure che tanto io spacco tutto lo stesso, 1969), Accidental Death of an Anarchist (Morte accidentale di un anarchico, 1970), and We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! In 1977, Fo switched gears yet again to embark on what many label as his “feminist phase,” which includes Elizabeth: Almost By Chance a Woman (Quasi per caso una donna: Elisabetta, 1984). In some respects, We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, a farce that addresses pressing social issues as seen by female characters, is the knot that joins these last two phases. The play reflects a period of social and political upheaval that involved workers and women, and that drastically altered the shape of Italian society in the 1970s.

Events in History at the Time of the Play

Unrest in the Italian factory

From 1968 to the early 1970s, the Italian factory became the setting of intense labor disputes, many of which stemmed from grievances about poor working conditions and low pay. Unrest erupted on March 7, 1968, when La Confederazione Generale Italiana dei Lavoratori (CG1L; The Italian General Workers’ Confederation) called a general strike over pension reform. This particular act of protest took place just as parliament was preparing to debate the issue, which had been looming in the background ever since late 1967. The strike represented a watershed moment in Italy’s labor history, as it not only signaled a fierce act of protest against the country’s center-left government, but also demonstrated a degree of unity among workers and competing unions that had never been seen before in Italy (Lumley, States of Emergency, p. 170). While the general strike raged in the spring of 1968, workers in many of Italy’s largest factories began organizing shop-floor rebellions in protest against their employers. In April, textile workers at Valdagno in the Veneto region demonstrated by dismantling a statue of business leader Gaetano Marzotto on display in the town square, while wildcat strikes broke out at Montedison’s plant in Porto Marghera in July of 1968.

Although relations between labor and management proved tenuous in many Italian factories during 1968, the situation at most of these locations paled in comparison to that at the Pirelli rubber factory in Milan. In February, the management of Pirelli signed a national contract for the rubber sector, of which the bulk of the factory’s workers disapproved. Discontent over the contract led to complaints regarding other unresolved issues, such as inadequate pay, production speed, and unpleasant working conditions. As a result of these grievances, a state of “permanent conflict” (conflittualita permanente) took hold at Pirelli (Lumley, States of Emergency, p. 183). Disaffected Pirelli workers began coordinating an independent rank-and-file organization dubbed II Comitato Unitario di Base (CUB; Unitary Base Committee) to make their voices heard. They also implemented output-reduction strikes, slowing production, which cost the management exorbitant sums of money. This practice of self-reduction represented a new kind of workplace disobedience, which Pirelli workers used alongside more traditional methods, such as lightning strikes and work stoppages. Later, in the mid-1970s, Italian consumers would implement a variation of self-reduction to combat rising inflation. But for now, the self-reduction strategy remained tied to the workplace, where it pointed to ever worsening relations between labor and management. In the coming months, this tension between worker and employer would spiral out of control nationwide.

The hot autumn: a season of discontent

By the autumn of 1969, the workers’ movement had not only taken root in factories across the nation, it had also infected other sectors of Italian society. During that fateful autumn, the contract for engineering workers came up for renewal. This, coupled with the tumultuous labor disputes of the past several months, led many to forecast momentous conflicts between labor and management. In its September 21st edition, the newspaper 24 ore (24 Hours), itself closely linked to industrial interests in Milan, coined the term “autunno caldo” (Hot Autumn) to refer to the mood sweeping through the country during this conflict-ridden period. As Robert Lumley observes, this label may have been used to demonize protesting workers and their supporters: “Without undue forcing, this particular metaphor can be seen as part of a genre in which industrial action, demonstrations and riots were described as ‘volcanic explosions,’‘sicknesses’ and ‘abnormalities,’ metaphors which proliferated in the conservative press during subsequent events” (Lumley, States of Emergency, p. 208).

Events in 1969 at the Fiat automotive plant in Turin best illustrate the types of conflicts that characterized the hot autumn. Disturbances began erupting at Fiat in the spring of 1969; however, it was not until September of that year that the situation grew truly untenable. When Fiat workers demanded a pay raise, management responded by suspending some 7,000 employees as punishment for alleged insubordination. Italy’s unions struck back by moving up the deadline for renewal of the engineering contract, which prompted a national demonstration of workers in that sector on September 25, 1969. Meanwhile, in Milan, the situation was scarcely any better. A massive strike over questions of union rights, such as the recognition of elected delegates, the need for a factory council, and mass meetings during work hours, paralyzed the Pirelli rubber factory. In the midst of these escalating tensions, Italy’s unions still hoped to win important concessions from management regarding the disputed engineering contract.

In the summer of 1969, the unions began drawing up a list of demands that needed to be met in the new contract: pay raises; a 40-hour week to be implemented over the course of three years; parity between manual and clerical workers; and union rights within the factory (Lumley, States of Emergency, p. 220). Interestingly enough, however, the formal demands identified by the unions did not always correspond to the concessions workers themselves hoped to win. An inquiry into working conditions for female employees at the Borletti factory showed their complaints to be mainly about the piece-rate and grading systems, and about work-related illnesses. Migrant workers and workers in so-called unskilled sectors of production often shared many of these frustrations; however, the formal demands put forth by the unions did not reflect these issues. The methods of protest invoked by workers in factories revealed the existence of this basic discrepancy between their interests and those of the unions that represented them.

Workers decorated their factories with graffiti and revolutionary posters; they also organized marches throughout Italian cities, sometimes on an almost daily basis. Between November and December of 1969 rising tensions escalated into violent conflicts. The first of these outbursts occurred on November 6 during a demonstration in Corso Sempione in Milan against the RAI’s (Radiotelevisione Italiana) coverage of industrial conflicts. Several engineering workers were arrested and subsequently jailed as a result of this demonstration, which led sympathetic protesters to picket local police stations. An even more dangerous situation took place just twelve days later during another demonstration in via Larga, which resulted in a standoff between protestors and police that left a young officer, Antonio Annarumma, dead. A bombblast on December 12, 1969, rocked Piazza Fontana, also located in Milan, leading to the deaths of twelve people. In the wake of these tragic events, Italy’s conservative press pointed the finger of blame at the unions and their protesting membership. However, despite the conservative press’s best efforts, Italians did not universally line up to denounce the workers’ movement. In fact, distrust of the Italian government grew as word began to spread that the Piazza. Fontana bombing might in fact have been the work of militant fascists operating alongside allies within the government.

As Italy moved into the next decade, this atmosphere of distrust and conflict continued to plague the nation. The battle for improved working conditions spread to other facets of the workforce, such as public-sector workers like teachers, white-collar workers, and technicians. In 1972, the metalworkers’ contract came up for renewal, which led to a brief resurgence in militant labor protest in early 1973. Employers broke off contract negotiations in an attempt to stymie the unions, but this method failed to obtain the desired result, and instead led to the two-day occupation of the Fiat plant in Mirafiori. Management quickly resumed negotiations, which led to the signing of a new metalworkers’ contract later that year. The implementation of this contract ranked as a triumph for Italy’s trade unions. Although the workers’ movement of this period may have experienced many such triumphs, it also faced certain hardships. As the 1970s dawned, a future of economic instability, terrorism, and growing social awareness awaited Italian society.

A time of economic uncertainty

In the early 1970s the industrialized world was beset with economic difficulties, which would in one form or another, shape both international relations and domestic policy for many nations well into the 1980s. Italy was no exception.

Economic hardship began for many nations at this time with the oil crisis that took shape in the fall of 1973, when the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) voted to increase the price of crude oil. In the wake of this decision, oil prices soared throughout the industrialized world. The effects of the oil crisis reverberated through many facets of society: industry increased prices, which led to a downturn in profits, while the consumer saw a surge in energy costs. The Italian economy fared especially poorly in this tenuous climate; Italy lacked sufficient domestic energy resources, which made the country especially reliant on imported oil. As a result, soaring oil prices crippled the nation’s economy. At the same time, Italy suffered from a rather weak government and a history of labor unrest, which complicated an already difficult economic situation. One historian observes that for much of the decade, Italy’s economy followed a “stop-go” pattern of development (Ginsborg, p. 352). From 1972-73, the economy experienced a slight upsurge, followed the next year by a paralyzing recession. The economy rebounded in 1976, only to falter again a year later in 1977.

SLOGANS OF THE REVOLUTION

Agnelti, Pirelli—ladri gemetli (Agnelli, Pirelli [the two industry leaders]—thieves the pair of them)

Siamo-stanchi-di pagare-tutti-vizi-dei padroni (We are tf red of paying for all the bosses’ vices)

Tutto il poter-agli operai (All power to the workers)

Lo stato dei padroni-si abbatte e non si cambia (The bosses’ state is for smashing, not changing)

Cosa volete? Tutto. Quando? Subito. (What do you want? Everything. When do you want it? Now)

Inconsistency was just one of many economic problems facing the country at this time. Throughout the 1970s, Italy held the dubious distinction of having the highest rate of inflation of any Western nation. Inflation reached a record high in 1974, and failed to significantly decline thereafter throughout the rest of the decade. Soaring prices proved to be a special hardship for the Italian consumer. The consumer, however, faced other, perhaps more serious dilemmas; not only prices but also unemployment began to rise.

In order to conform to International Monetary Fund regulations, the Bank of Italy introduced deflationary policies during the early 1970s, and it severely limited the money supply. These measures sparked a business recession that forced some factories to close their doors and led others to fire some workers. As a result, industrial production floundered and unemployment reached astronomical heights in the country.

Italian citizens reacted to surging prices and rising unemployment by implementing their own brand of self-reduction in 1974. Consumers began paying only what they believed to be a fair price for goods and services, rather then abiding by the prices set by distributors. In some cases, consumers simply refused to pay anything at all.

The rise of terrorism

Some Italian citizens grew tired of waiting for the nation’s unions and its government to improve the lives of the working class. A number of these disgruntled individuals organized terrorist groups, which aimed to effect change through armed conflict. One of Italy’s most notorious terrorist organizations, the Red Brigades, was founded as early as October 20, 1970. “They described themselves as ‘autonomous workers’ organizations’ prepared to fight the employers” by means of violent, armed struggle if necessary (Ginsborg, p. 361).

For the most part, the founding members of the Red Brigades came from working- or lower-middle-class families. Most of the activists had been students who previously participated in non-violent left-wing groups, such as the FGCI, or Communist Party youth movement. Many of their early actions focused on two Milanese factories: Pirelli, and Sit Siemens. In the beginning, the Red Brigades limited their activity to vandalism and occasional beatings. This began to change on April 18, 1974, when the terrorists kidnapped a Genoese judge, Mario Sossi, and held him hostage for some 35 days. This bold act earned the group national attention and inspired a police crackdown on terrorist organizations throughout Italy. The police uncovered hideouts, made a number of high-profile arrests, and in some extreme cases engaged in shootouts with terrorists who refused to be taken alive. By 1976, nearly all the members of the Red Brigade’s so-called executive committee had been either captured or killed; however, the organization would remain active even after losing its founding members.

Another terrorist group, led by publishing magnate Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, also surfaced in the early 1970s. Feltrinelli christened his group the Gruppo di Azione Patigiana (GAP; Partisan Action Group). However, the GAP was largely unsuccessful in attracting the same attention as the Red Brigades. As for Feltrinelli, he accidentally blew himself up in 1972, while attempting to plant a bomb at Segrate factory near Milan.

Feminism

While the rise of terrorism represented an extreme reaction to the social, economic, and political climate of 1970s Italy, it was not the only significant movement to grow out of this period: the late 1960s and 1970s also witnessed the resurgence of feminism.

On December 1, 1966, II Gruppo Demistificazione Autoritarismo (Demystification of Patriarchal Authoritarianism), or DEMAU, issued its manifesto. This document, entitled Manifesto programmatico del gruppo De Man (Programmatic Manifesto of the DEMAU Group) identified an apparent conflict between women and society: in the 1960s, many people viewed women, or more precisely the question of women’s rights, as a problem for society. However, according to DEMAU, if this is the case, then it must follow that society is in turn a problem for women (The Milan Women’s Bookstore Collective, p. 35). This refreshing perspective placed women in the position of subject, rather then object, for the first time, and in this respect, proved innovative. The DEMAU group went on to study women’s relationship to the family, concentrating on the ways in which the family subordinated and dominated women. The DEMAU group did not last very long. By 1968, it had lost nearly half its members, many of whom chose to join male groups addressing questions of workers rights; however, DEMAU proved instrumental in raising questions about women’s role within the family, and in a larger context, within society as a whole.

DEMAU paved the way for the birth of several other important feminist groups in the early 1970s. In Rome and Milan in 1970, Rivolta Femminile (Feminine Revolt) circulated its own manifesto, along with a landmark essay by noted feminist writer Carla Lonzi, entitled “Spuntiamo Su Hegel” (“We Spit on Hegel”). In its manifesto, Rivolta Femminile denounced marriage, unpaid domestic labor, and male control over female sexuality. While Rivolta Femminile was publishing this influential document, other feminist organizations were also cropping up throughout Italy. II Movimento de Liberazione della Donna (MLD; Women’s Liberation Movement) appeared in 1970, while Lotta Femminista (Feminist Struggle) came into being in 1971. Lotta Femminista spearheaded the “wages for housework” campaign, which held that women (and men) should receive financial compensation from the Italian government for domestic work. In its own manifesto, MLD made demands pursuant to four key issues: the right for women to control their bodies (legalization of abortion, availability of free contraceptives); the elimination of gender stereotypes in schools and workplaces and the dismantlement of myths associated with women (the myth of the ideal wife or mother); the elimination of economic exploitation (through the institution of public daycare), and legal equalities. While the various feminist groups focused on different aspects of the women’s question, one nagging issue seemed to unite all the organizations: the debate over abortion.

Beginning in the early 1970s, II Centro Italiano di Serilizzazione e Aborto (CISA; The Italian Center for Sterilization and Abortion), in tandem with the Women’s Liberation Movement, launched a campaign in support of a woman’s right to choose an abortion. In 1975, mass demonstrations in favor of abortion attracted some 25,000 participants, while just one year later the number rose to 100,000 (Lumley, States of Emergency, p. 321). Women also collected signatures to force a referendum on the issue, and in some cases even engaged in a practice known as autodenuncia (self-incrimination), wherein women procured illegal abortions and then turned themselves in to the authorities. By 1978, this action paid off: parliament passed a law legalizing abortion that year. However, the victory came at a high price for feminist activists. The law stipulated that women must consult with a doctor or social worker prior to obtaining an abortion, and also instituted a seven-day waiting period. Additionally, the law mandated that women under 18 seek parental consent prior to the procedure. Finally, doctors could object to performing abortions on moral grounds. Although all these stipulations irritated many feminist groups, the debate surrounding the issue galvanized action on other women’s issues, such as rape and domestic violence. Thus, the battle over abortion affected women in multiple ways.

The Play in Focus

Plot summary

The farce unfolds in an anonymous Italian city during the chaos of inflation and unemployment that characterized 1970s Italy. As the play begins, we meet Antonia, a working-class woman struggling to manage her household amidst rising prices. In the play’s first scene, Antonia returns from the market, carrying a veritable cornucopia of food, accompanied by her loyal friend Margherita. When Margherita demands to know how Antonia managed to afford so much food, the heroine relates the story of a madcap self-reduction strike at the local market:

Antonia: This morning I had to go grocery shopping, but I didn’t know how I could buy anything, because I didn’t have any money. So I walked into the supermarket, and I see a crowd of women. They’re all raising hell because the prices are higher than they were just the day before. The manager’s trying to calm them down. “Well, there’s nothing I can do about it,” he said. “The distributors set the prices, and they’ve decided to raise them.” “They decided? With whose permission?” “With nobody’s permission. It’s the free market. Free competition.” “Free competition against who? Against us? And we’re supposed to give in? … While they fire our husbands … and keep raising prices …” So I yelled, “You’re the thieves!” … And then I hid, because I was really scared.

(Fo, We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, pp. 9-10)

One of the disgruntled shoppers proclaims that the women will pay what they wish, and if the manager doesn’t like it, then they won’t pay anything at all. As the women begin helping themselves to groceries, the police arrive clad in riot gear to subdue them. The women, however, remain undaunted and calmly exit the store, bags in hand.

Although Antonia relates this adventure to Margherita beaming with pride, her joy is quickly tempered when Margherita asks how Antonia plans to explain the presence of so much food to her husband, Giovanni, who is a devout member of the Communist Party:

Antonia: Yeah … maybe it’s a bit much. The problem is, he’s a man. You know how men are. They can’t see the big picture. He’s a law and order freak. Who knows what kind of tantrum he’ll throw! “How could you do such a thing?” he’ll say. “My father built a good life for his children by following the rules. I follow rules. We’re poor, but we’re honest!” He doesn’t know that I’ve spent everything, that there’s nothing left to pay the gas, the electric or the rent. … I don’t even know how many months behind we are.

(We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, pp. 11-12)

In order to conceal her crime from Giovanni, Antonia gives some of the purloined food to Margherita, who hides it under her coat to keep him from seeing it. However, an observant Giovanni notices Margherita’s sudden “weight gain,” and questions his wife about it. Antonia, lying, replies that Margherita is pregnant. Confused, Giovanni wonders how her pregnancy progressed so quickly and why her husband doesn’t seem to know about it. A fast-thinking Antonia says Margherita hasn’t told her husband because she stopped taking the birth-control pill in order to follow papal doctrine.

Later on, Antonia departs to visit Margherita, leaving a fanmished Giovanni to eat cat food in her absence. While Giovanni is waiting for his wife, a policeman arrives to inform him that the authorities are systematically searching area homes for goods stolen from the local market earlier that day. When Giovanni expresses his outrage at the looting that took place at the market, the officer surprises him by revealing he in fact sympathizes with the women:

Sergeant: Sure they were … they couldn’t put up with all this for much longer: You might not believe me, but sometimes it disgusts me to be a policeman … to have to rob people of their dignity. And for who … for the politicians and slumlords who steal them blind and leave them homeless and hungry.

(We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, p. 21)

Later on, Margherita and Antonia return to the apartment. A state trooper arrives to search the residence yet again, but this officer is not as sympathetic as his colleague. In an effort to rid themselves of him, Margherita feigns labor. This, however, only complicates matters when the state trooper insists that Margherita go to the hospital in an awaiting ambulance. Margherita and Antonia reluctantly elect to follow the trooper’s advice, leaving Giovanni alone once again in the semi-deserted apartment. As Giovanni awaits the return of Antonia and Margherita, Luigi, Margherita’s husband, arrives in search of his wife. Luigi explains that he left work early on a work stoppage and arrived home to find the doors open and his wife missing. Giovanni quickly breaks the news of Margherita’s alleged pregnancy to a stunned Luigi. Together, the two men decide to go in search of their wives. In the true tradition of farce, Margherita and Antonia return home shortly after their husbands depart, having managed to evade the forced trip to the hospital. Antonia decides to hide her pilfered goods in her father-in-law’s shed, so she stuffs them under her coat to create the illusion of pregnancy, and prepares to head out.

Meanwhile, as Giovanni and Luigi frantically prowl the streets in search of their wives, they stumble upon sacks of coffee, which apparently fell from a truck. Unable to resist the temptation, they help themselves to some of it and prepare to make their escape, just as the ubiquitous state trooper arrives. The bumbling duo stumbles off, managing to evade capture, while the state trooper heads back towards Antonia and Giovanni’s apartment. Once he tricks the two women into letting him in, the trooper attempts to intimidate Antonia and Margherita so that they will admit to being in possession of stolen goods. However, the eternally crafty Antonia turns the tables on him; when the lights go out because of her failure to pay the power bill, she convinces the trooper he is going blind. In an attempt to escort him out of the darkened apartment, she hits him in the head rendering him unconscious. Believing that she killed him, Antonia tries to resuscitate the unconscious trooper by pumping oxygen from Giovanni’s welding equipment into him. However, Antonia succeeds only in bloating the trooper’s stomach, thus once again creating the illusion of pregnancy.

Amidst all this chaos, Giovanni and Luigi somehow find their way home, wanting to know how it is that Margherita is no longer pregnant, but Antonia apparently is. After attempting to string together a series of convincing fibs, Antonia finally confesses to her part in the selfreduction strike:

Antonia: Let him kill me! Go ahead. I’m sick of this lousy life! And I’m fed up with your sermonizing … about law and order, and how you follow the rules, rules, rules … with such pride. Bullshit! You swallow your pride every day. And then when other people try to find a little dignity by breaking free of the rules you call them looters, bums, terrorists. Terrorism…Terrorism is being held hostage by a minimum-wage job. But you don’t want to know how things really are.

(We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, p. 63)

Much to Antonia’s astonishment, Giovanni actually agrees with her impassioned speech; the events of the past several hours have made him see the motivation behind Antonia’s recent actions. The four go to the window to see an angry mob chasing away the police; as the play ends Giovanni turns to address the audience: “Desperation’s funny isn’t it?” he asks (We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, p. 65). This question cuts to the very heart of We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, a play that finds humor in desperate times.

Political humor in Italy

Dario Fo’s work belongs to a broader trend in Italian history of the 1960s and 1970s: the tendency to confront political and social issues through humor. During the time of Fo’s writing, Italian cinema, and in some instances even newspapers, had begun to view political and social problems through the lens of satire.

In 1962 Pietro Germi directed the famed comedy Divorzio all’italiana (“Divorce Italian Style”), which provided a satirical glimpse into gender relations in southern Italy while simultaneously tackling the politically loaded issue of divorce. During the ensuing two decades, several other comic films also exaned political and social questions pertinent to the times. Lina Wertmuller’s 1971 work La seduzione di Mimi (“The Seduction of Mimi”) presents the story of a Sicilian man who opts to look for work in Turin after losing his job for voting for a Communist candidate against a Mafia-backed opponent. Franco Brusati’s 1973 film Pane e Cioccolato (“1974 motion picture ;Bread and Chocolate”) addresses the plight of southern Italian emigrants. The 1974 motion picture Ceravamo tanto amati (“We All Loved Each Other So Much”) takes a humorous look at the politics of post-war Italy by following the ongoing friendship of three veterans who each take turns falling in love with the same woman. As the preceding examples make clear, political humor infected the cinema in the 1960s and 1970s. However, filmmakers were not the only artists using humor to confront challenging political issues.

Political cartoons also gained in importance following the upheaval of 1968. In the 1950s, stringent censorship laws, coupled with an underdeveloped mass media, made the political cartoon next to impossible to realize. Throughout much of the 1960s the fledgling nature of Italy’s mass-media outlets rendered it difficult for artists to find suitable showcases for their work. However, after 1968 cartoons became a prolific means of subverting the establishment and voicing discontent over numerous hot-button issues. From the late 1960s onwards, most political cartoonists identified themselves with left-wing politics; that notwithstanding, many, such as Alfredo Chiappori, found employment at mainstream newspapers and magazines (Lumley, “The Political Cartoon,” p. 266).

The plays that belong to Fo’s revolutionary period, which were more overtly political in con-tent than the works he penned during the bourgeois phase of his career, fit nicely into this culture of comedy.

Sources and literary context

Although several important theatrical figures and traditions play a part in shaping Fo’s play, perhaps the greatest inspiration for We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! remains the events that actually took place in Italy in 1974.

Critics, and Fo himself, identify a number of other overarching influences. The first is the com-media dell’arte. A theatrical tradition dating back to the 1500s, commedia dell’arte featured Harlequin, a clownish figure often governed by his insatiable appetites. Appetite is very much at issue in We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay!, which one scholar even classifies as a “comedy of hunger”:

Hunger is a recurring theme in the comedies of Dario Fo. His characters are not just hungry for food. They are hungry for dignity, hungry for justice, hungry for love. The protagonists of We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay are driven by their collective hungers to break free from the constraints in which their poverty has confined them.

(Jenkins, “The Comedy of Hunger,” p. iv)

Fo also held in high regard several other theatrical traditions, such as vaudeville and bedroom farce. He once defined We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! as a kind of pochade, or one-act French farce; a play in two acts, Fo’s work fails to adhere perfectly to the pochade, but it no doubt borrows heavily from the tradition of French farce. The French playwrights Feydeau and Labiche influenced Fo a great deal, as did clowns, circus performers, and especially the Neapolitan theatrical tradition. Other influences include giullari and fobulatori. Although literally translated as “jugglers” in English, the giullari were theatrical performers in medieval Italy. They often recited one-man shows in streets or town squares. Fo encountered many fabulatori (storytellers) during his childhood. Often they were fishermen who recounted elaborate folktales in a theatrical manner. However, of all Fo’s most cherished dramatic mentors, the fifteenth-century actor Ruzzante ranks the highest.

Ruzzante, whose real name was Angelo Beolco, lived from approximately 1495 to 1542. He probably came originally from the northeastern region of Veneto. In Ruzzante’s work, Fo identified what he terms a “theater of situation,” which in his estimation lay at the heart of popular or workingclass theater (Farrell, “Fo and Ruzzante,” p. 84). In this theater of situation, class conflict and any situations that result therefrom, determine character behavior. The reader or spectator of Fo’s We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! may immediately recognize such a technique. For the most part, the backgrounds of the characters remain unknown to us, and their behavior during the course of the play depends entirely on the situations with which they are confronted. Fo also adapted from Ruzzante the technique of allowing characters to speak directly to the audience, as Giovanni does at the end of We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! (Farrell, “Fo and Ruzzante,” p. 91).

Reception

Just a few short months after the staging of Fo’s play, Italian citizens actually did begin implementing self-reduction in stores throughout the country. In fact, when several women were tried for stealing food from stores following the play’s 1974 debut, prosecuting attorneys attempted to implicate the playwright himself. Fortunately for Fo, the judge in this particular case did not agree with the prosecutors’ assessment of Fo’s perceived role in the incident.

Prosecutors were not the only ones to react unfavorably to Fo’s play. The response to We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! proved rather mixed following the play’s Italian debut. Many critics found it difficult to reconcile the work’s political message with its farcical structure. Critic Lanfranco Binni even went so far as to label We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! as didactic. While many critics focused on the play’s apparent advocacy of self-reduction, few noticed its feminist undertones, or subtle satire of the Communist Party, reflected in the character of Giovanni. In the years since We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! critics have in fact begun to appreciate the work’s larger significance with respect to the burgeoning feminist movement, going so far as to label the play Fo’s first real feminist creation.

Despite the mixed reception in Italy following its initial premiere, We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! remains one of Fo’s most popular works abroad, having been performed in over 30 countries. Giovanni’s parting question to the audience regarding desperation perhaps explains the resonance of this particular work throughout the world.

—Sarah Annunziato

For More Information

Behan, Tom. Dario Fo: Revolutionary Theatre. London: Pluto, 2000.

Farrell, Joseph. Dario Fo and Franca Rame: Harlequins of the Revolution. London: Methuen, 2001.

——. “Fo and Ruzzante: Debts and Obligations.” In Dario Fo: Stage Text and Tradition. Ed. Joseph Farrell and Antonio Scuderi. Carbondale, III: Southern Illinois University Press, 2000.

Fo, Dario. We Won’t Pay! We Won’t Pay! and Other Plays. The Collected Plays of Dario Fo. Vol. 1. Ed. Franca Rame. Trans. Ron Jenkins. New York: Theatre Communications Group, 2001.

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