Review: "Patria, The Town of Cain and Abel" Explodes onto the Stage

Patria, The Town of Cain and Abel (Patria, il Paese di Caino e Abele)

Conceived by Fabio Banfo, Giacomo Ferraù, and Giulia Viana

Directed by Giacomo Ferraù

Presented by Centro Teatrale MaMiMò and Eco di fondo with the collaboration of the Flamigni Archive

May 10, 2026 at Culture Lab LIC, 5-25 46th Avenue, Long Island City, Queens, NYC

May 13, 2028 at Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimò at NYU, 24 W 12 St., Manhattan, NYC

May 16, 2026 at The Rat NYC, 68-117 Jay St., Brooklyn, NYC

Fabio Banfo in Patria, The Town of Cain and Abel. Photo courtesy of Mamimo Company.
Solo show Patria, The Town of Cain and Abel (Patria, il Paese di Caino e Abele) brings a narrative of Italian sectarianism and violence in the second half of the twentieth century to NYC at a time when such a story could not seem more relevant to audiences here as U.S. institutions and norms continue to fracture and divisions deepen. As the play's subtitle suggests, Cain and Abel serve as the microcosmic model for the pitting of a nation's people against one another, and Patria simultaneously represents, like the story of these brothers, a personal, family history. Captivatingly performed by Fabio Banfo, also the production's dramaturg, Patria centers on a small-town innocent known as Abele whose life is impacted and bounded by acts of violence throughout the tumultuous decades of Italy's "Years of Lead." Presented in Italian with English supertitles by Sandra Bajkanovic and Tetyana Bezručenko (translation by Sandra Bajkanovic), Patria's NYC performances are part of the 2026 In Scena! Italian Theater Festival, which runs this year from May 5 through 19 at various venues throughout the five boroughs.

"Boom" is both the first and the final word spoken in Patria, and the differences between those two enunciations mark the emotional distance that the audience travels over the course of this often humorous but ultimately heart-breaking play. Patria begins with Abele interrupting his brother, Caino, leaving home with what in hindsight is a suspiciously heavy suitcase that he says is filled with books. We later learn that the names Abele and Caino were attached to the brothers following a childhood accident that left Abele with some mental impairment and for which Caino was blamed. This time, though, it is Caino who is victimized, blown up on a train in a 1974 bombing that came to be known as the "Italicus massacre." Abele, who is seen as "dumb" because of his accident, refuses to believe that his brother is dead, since there is no body, a conviction that passing years will do nothing to change. From there, Abele thinks up various ways that he might reunite with his brother, from acting on a dream in which the Pope told him to defeat Communism by going on a tv show to forming a 'terrorist' group with his friends from the special needs class at school, and revisits memories such as the heady events of the 1960s, which included his father abandoning the family, and the day of the accident that would brand the brother Caino and Abele. Significantly hampering Abele's efforts, though, and directly connected time and again to historical episodes of violence and crime in Italy, is the fact that, as one character says to Abele, "The last person who ever managed to leave this town was your father."
Fabio Banfo in Patria, The Town of Cain and Abel. Photo courtesy of Mamimo Company.
Banfo of course plays that character and all the others, who in addition to the brothers include their mother and aunt, as well as locals like bar owner Eunice and the town's superannuated mayor. Extremely compelling in Alfredino, which was part of last year's In Scena! Festival (you can read our review here), Banfo here conjures men and women, children and adults, priests and criminals with the same spellbinding, protean skill and a few basic props. His whirlwind of a performance is effectively framed by lighting that primarily switches between footlights and a large spotlight and sound design that includes voiceover clips from news media and well-chosen music cues (among which the A-Team theme makes an appearance). In the end, if Patria tells a story of the suffering inflicted by communists, fascists, and the mafia and of being trapped in what Eunice describes as a country of boobs, politics, and mothers suffering for dead sons, it also raises the possibility that blame regarding the brothers' accident was incorrectly assigned and reminds us that things might look very different from other perspectives. And if Cain and Abel may not be so different, what does that imply for the rest of us?

-John R. Ziegler and Leah Richards

More reviews from In Scena! 2026:
Closed for the Holiday
Tale of a Potato
Traviata - A Free Prose Opera

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