In Season 3, Episode 15 of No Reservations (2007), there are many references to Dante and Inferno.
Contributed by Brendan Keefe
Citings & Sightings of Dante's Works in Contemporary Culture
In Season 3, Episode 15 of No Reservations (2007), there are many references to Dante and Inferno.
Contributed by Brendan Keefe
“Nel suo nuovo spettacolo ‘Nel mezzo del casin di nostra vita,’ Maurizio Lastrico recita i suoi celebri endecasillabi ‘danteschi,’ che mescolano il tono alto e quello basso, che raccontano con ironia di incidenti quotidiani, di una sfortuna che incombe, di un caos che gode nel distruggere i rari momenti di tranquillità della vita. Propone inoltre le sue storie condensate, in cui la sintesi e l’omissione generano un gioco comico di grande impatto.” —Teatro.it
The show first ran in 2019 and has run continuously through 2020 and the first half of 2021. See teatro.it for more information.
Cristian Ispir, Associate Fellow of the Centre de Recherche Universitaire Lorrain d’Histoire, writes, “The influence of Dante on the HBO series Westworld is as subtle as it is undeniable. The focal point of Season 1 is the ‘Maze’, an elusive place/concept represented by a schematic labyrinth having a human figure at its centre, analogous to the human effigy in Paradiso 33 (“painted with our effigy” [Par. 33.131]) which symbolises the accomplishment of human self-understanding and the end-point of Dante’s upward journey. In the simulacrum that is Westworld, the Dantean idea of reaching self-knowledge through a labyrinthine guided pilgrimage is key to the emancipation of the artificial ‘hosts’ from the engineered universe they inhabit and a kind of trasumanar available to each agent endowed with free will. The Westworld theme park becomes an existential iteration of the Comedy moving through vertical worlds away from ignorance and towards self-realisation.”
See Cristian Ispir’s blog Biblonia, where he often posts on Dante.
“Thomas Adès’ ‘Inferno,’ the first half of what will eventually be a full-length Dante ballet, makes an uproarious heaven of hell. An equal-opportunity score, it offers wry reasons for celebrating our vices — be we among the selfish, gluttonous, suicidal, deviant, papally pretentious; be we illicit lovers, pollsters (the fortune-tellers), hypocrites, thieves, lost souls of one sort or another, satanic majesties or, yes (thanks for thinking of us, Tom), critics.
“It proved the most ambitious and electrifying of more than five-dozen commissions celebrating the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s just-completed centennial season and a bonanza for choreographer Wayne McGregor. In an exceptional collaboration among the Royal Ballet, the L.A. Phil and the Music Center, the staged “Inferno” had its premiere at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion over the weekend in a production for which celebrated British artist and filmmaker Tacita Dean created the design. The composer conducted with the L.A. Phil in the pit.” [. . .] –Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times, July 14, 2019.
“In [Luca Guadagnino’s] movie Call Me By Your Name (2017), during the scene where Elio’s parents are sunbathing in Italy, Elio’s father is reading a book with a marking on the spine that says La Divina Commedia di Dante Alighieri.” –Contributor Alex Lee
Contributed by Robert Alex Lee (Florida State University ’21)
All submissions will be considered for posting. Bibliographic references and scholarly essays are also welcome for consideration.
Coggeshall, Elizabeth, and Arielle Saiber, eds. Dante Today: Citings and Sightings of Dante’s Works in Contemporary Culture. Website. Access date.