their intellectual prowess who are happy to undertake risky trading which they later admitted the barely understood and just as willing to condone the miss-selling of loans, insurance and mortgages, so long as the enormous profits swelled their coffers. While the longer they got away with it the more they believed that it couldn’t fail. In Ligurio we see the clever young traders devising ever more complex schemes, convinced of their own infallibility and that of the financial instruments that will make them rich. In the Priest we can see the regulators and politicians willing to overlook recklessness and support excess in return for growing economies and patronage, while proclaiming the one true faith of responsible self regulating markets. It might be too simplistic and crass to match the bankers and politicians against the characters of The Mandrake Root or the theatre of commedia. Just as it is too convenient to see them all as simply greedy and stupid. However, the character traits are there and the reason why these stock characters have endured in theatre and film is because they do represent archetypes that exist in people. Comedy is a powerful means to understand truth and even the serious new programmes on BBC Radio 4 regularly find comedic ways to discuss the crisis and the HBO drama ‘Too Big To Fail’ had moments of almost Chaplinesque comedy, despite being based on supposedly accurate records of what took place during the collapse of Lehman brothers.
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Commedia dell’arte Although based on earlier theatrical forms and other traditions from other European countries, Commedia dell’arte developed in the Venetian region of Italy in the mid 16th century as a masked outdoor theatre of improvised performance. Translated it means the ‘comedy of craft’, arte does not refer to “art” as we currently consider the word, but rather to artigiani, artisans. In the earliest period the term used was commedia all’improviso. Commedia was performed outside on temporary stages and used props rather than scenery. Traditionally a masked theatre form, as it developed some playwrights like the 17th century Goldoni dispensed with masks. There are a huge number of commedia characters and all represent differing social types, foolish old men, devious servants, military officers full of false bravado. Whilst each character has its own mask they also have particular physical characteristics. Harlequin, also known as Arlecchino, a mischievous servant from Bergamo processes great agility and energy as well as being as gluttonous and stupid. His is capable of convincing himself of his own lies, even to the point where he will believe that he is dead, like Harold Lloyd in the silent classic ‘Never Weaken’ (1922). In il Capitano we see a military man who sees himself as a great lover and hero, but who always missing when it comes to any fighting and in his physicality we see his inflated self belief through his pushed out chest and his strutted walk. Pantalone the miserly Venetian merchant who despite his age still believes that he is attractive to women, whilst being the target of