Monologue. Fortunate Hope by and with Gianna Coletti

With a light and touching performance Gianna Coletti brings to the stage the life of Fortunata Speranza.

A woman who lost her job and to pass the time and exchange idle chat starts frequenting the bar below her house. It’s a little escape to break free from a frustrating reality.

One morning, while reading the newspaper, she feels watched: “I turn my head…don’t you see a chicken staring at me? I swear a chicken!”. She sees herself as a child. She sees herself as a child when she used to play with a little white hen on the farm where she lived with her mother just outside Milan. A little hen like the one on display on the slot machine at the bar “The golden egg-laying hen”. And so, almost by chance, she starts playing. Unexpectedly she wins and from that moment on her secret life made of tricks, even quite creative ones, to find the money or to recover what she loses but also to make sure that neither her husband nor her son notice what is happening to her.

She lives in solitude but often talks to her mother even though she is no longer there; their relationship is still so alive that their “opinion exchanges” are always very colorful. Unlike many female players who prefer one game, Fortunata ranges: from bingo to the lottery, from slot machines to Scratch and Win. She is convinced that this way she will have more opportunities. And then the game helps her not to think and problems, almost magically, disappear. Sometimes reality makes itself felt, Fortunata realizes the situation she has fallen into and from which she does not know how to escape, but it only lasts a moment then everything becomes possible again. She plays without inhibitions because, in her opinion, luck should be encouraged. It happens to everyone once in a lifetime and when it’s her turn she wants to be ready to seize it.

CONTINUES MEETING. “Female gambling: a hidden addiction”

• Introduction: Daniela Tarquini from San Benedetto (non-profit social cooperative)
• Speaker: Simona Bianchi (psychologist SerD Livorno Responsible for gambling addiction)
• Presenter: Martina Parigi
• The initiative is part of the Project “Let’s win together against gambling: 1,2,3 let’s play our game“