text Hattie Naylor
translation Monica Capuani
russain recorded voice Laura Pasut Rosellini
light design Simona Gallo
scenograph Paola Villani
costum Simona D’Amico
direction assistant Elvira Berarducci
performer, sound design and direction Federica Rosellini
management Vittorio Stasi

production Cardellino srl
thanks to Trac centro di residenza teatrale / Factory compagnia
representative rights Agenzia Danesi Tolnay
general direction Maria Laura Rondanini

Ivan and the Dogs originates from the account of an episode experienced by Ivan at the age of four, evoked as if it were happening in the present. The narrative takes the form of a dark fairy tale, yet the story is real, set in early 1990s Russia, a period marked by the extreme poverty of the Boris Yeltsin era. Ivan lives with his mother and a violent man who wants to get rid of him. And so, Ivan leaves. On the streets of Moscow, the cold and the lack of mercy make survival nearly impossible, but his encounter with a pack of stray dogs that welcomes and protects him becomes his salvation.
An odyssey begins that would soon end in death if Ivan hadn’t encountered creatures who took him in and gave him a chance to survive. A pack of stray dogs…
Federica Rosellini, a musician and performer, alone on stage with her electronic equipment, speaks and composes, blending her mother’s voice, recorded in Russian, with melodies, lullabies, and rhythmic beats, crafting a soundscape in which she loses herself through words and movement.
She turns it into a sweet and desperate “solo,” an intimate, personal song of the soul, yet one capable of unexpectedly recounting the childhood of us all.