FLAGSHIP PROGRAMMES
National Network
Italy
Address
Via della Mercede 50Country
City
RomeProvince
ExeterMobile Phone
+39335353916Telephone
+39 0687671757E-Mail (2)
stap@teatrobrancaccio.itWebsite
Click HereYear of Establishment
2013Contact Person1
Flavio LongobardiJob Title 1
Partnerships and Operations CoordinatorContact Person 2
Rossella MarchiJob Title 2
Board MemberOrganisation Type
Non-Governmental OrganizationFields of Activity
Arts, Democracy and community development, Heritage, International/Cultural relations, Youth and educationGeneral Information
Structure: Livia Clementi (President), Rossella Marchi (Board Member), STAP Teaching staff, Flavio Longobardi (Volunteer as Partnerships & Operations Coordinator), Viola Produzioni Srl (Partner), Sala Umberto Srl (Partner). Budgetary resources 600-700k. Modalities of action: Courses in theatre, musical, voice and performing arts for all ages (5–65+) & backgrounds; theatre productions; participatory theatre and inclusive dance projects with people incarcerated, people with a migration background; people with disabilities. Summer theatre campus for children age 6-10. Main partner is Viola Produzioni Srl (Italy’s leading Centre of Theatre Production), Sala Umberto Srl with which we jointly run out theatre Accademy STAP Brancaccio. Ssocial projects are financed through competitive public grants, including funding from the Regione Lazio, the Comune di Roma, the Ministry of Culture, Fondazione Roma, the Chiesa Valdese and Zetema Progetto Cultura.
Mission and Objectives
ATC Saltimbanco believes that theatre belongs to everyone. Since 2013, we have used and promoted theatre as a tool for personal
growth, social connection, and transformation, building spaces where age, background, and ability are never barriers to expression. We
train, we produce, we include. And we do it in classrooms, theatres, prisons, and neighbourhoods across Rome, because we believe that
artistic expression is a fundamental right and not a luxury.
Objectives:
1. Training & Education: Courses in theatre, musical, voice and performing arts for all ages (5–65+) & backgrounds through STAP Brancaccio and BMA, in Italian, English and Spanish.
2. Inclusion: Bringing theatre into prisons, peripheral neighbourhoods and socially vulnerable contexts as a tool for rehabilitation and active citizenship.
3. Community Outreach: Provide summer campuses, intergenerational projects, school programmes and free or subsidised community
workshops.
4. Production: Creating original shows with professional, semiprofessional & disadvantage groups.
Values
1. Theatre as a common good: art is not a privilege. It belongs to everyone.
2. Active inclusion: Every person deserves a place to express themselves and find in theatre a space of freedom.
3. Quality: Passing on the performing arts requires rigour, research and continuous development: we train artists, teachers and future aware audiences.
4. Community & territory: we work with people, not just for them.
Main Projects / Activities
STAP BRANCACCIO & BRANCACCIO MUSICAL SCHOOL (BMA): ATC Saltimbanco works with 600+ students per year providing courses in theatre, musical, voice and performing arts in Italian, English and Spanish, for a wide range of target groups through dedicated projects:
Youth 5-17+; Adults; Seniors 65+; People incarcerated; People with a migration background; People with disabilities. Our courses don't just train performers, they create community. A recent example is Roma Bambina, an intergenerational project that brought STAP’s over-60 class and a middle school together on the same stage, exploring shared memory and active citizenship through theatre.
Our social projects include:
- Glossario - storie di famiglia (Glossary - family’s stories): A participatory theatre and inclusive dance project bringing together five couples, each composed of a person with a physical disability and a family member or chosen person of reference, to explore family bonds, the body and shared memory.
- GrattaCielo (Reaching for the Sky): A two-year participatory theatre project bringing together professional actresses from STAP Brancaccio and women who lived through vulnerability and resistance: women with migrant backgrounds, and women who have experienced gender-based violence. The first year it concluded with a choral performance exploring confinement, identity and resistance by drawing parallels between Lorca's patriarchal Spain and the lived experiences of the 8 women on stage.
- TEATRO IN CARCERE: A theatre programme inside Rebibbia Prison since 2019, working with inmates of the male section. Each edition consists of a 60-hour laboratory, from trust-building and body work, through collective storytelling and rehearsal, to a full theatrical production written, rehearsed and performed by the inmates themselves, guided by professional directors Emilia Martinelli and Tiziana Scrocca.
- OFFICINE TEATRABILI (Workrooms for All Abilities): A multi-year project exploring the dialogue between art and disability — physical and cognitive. Workshops, integrated theatre performances, conferences and national touring. Three editions: 2024, 2025 (Zetema Progetto Cultura) and 2026 (Ministry of Culture —Accessibility Grant).
- ESTA(R)TE (Summer Theatre Campus): A summer theatre campus for children and young people aged 6-10 at Teatro Brancaccio, Spazio Impero and Ostia Lido. Offered free of charge for 5 years in Torpignattara thanks to Fondazione Roma and this year at Ostia Lido.
How can you contribute to the Network in your country?
ATC Saltimbanco can contribute to the ALF Network in Italy in several concrete ways.
As a connector between professional theatre and grassroots communities, we bridge the world of professional performing arts (through our partnership with Viola Produzioni and the STAP Brancaccio Academy) and the social fabric of Rome's most diverse and vulnerable neighbourhoods. This dual position allows us to bring both artistic credibility and community rootedness to the Network.
As an experienced deliverer of intercultural and inclusive projects, we have a proven track record of working with women with migrant backgrounds, people in detention, people with disabilities, and young people in areas of socio-economic disadvantage. Our projects demonstrate our capacity to design and implement participatory programmes that generate real social impact.
As a disseminator and educator, through STAP Brancaccio we reach 600+ students per year across five venues in Rome, including schools, universities and community spaces. We are well positioned to disseminate ALF initiatives, mobilise young people and facilitate intercultural exchange at grassroots level.
As a network builder, we already collaborate with public institutions, foundations, universities, civic organisations and international cultural partners. We are members of the National Coordination of Prison Theatre and FITA, and our president sits on the juries of Italy's most prestigious theatre awards. We know how to build bridges between institutions and communities.
Our commitment: we would actively participate in ALF calls for proposals, share knowledge and methodologies with Network members, organise joint intercultural activities, and advocate for the role of theatre and the arts as tools for peace, dialogue and mutual understanding across the Euro-Mediterranean region.
Why do you want to join the ALF Network?
ATC Saltimbanco wants to join the ALF Network because we believe that the work we do in Rome is part of a much larger conversation that needs to happen across the Mediterranean. The stories we tell, the communities we work with, and the challenges we face are not uniquely Roman or Italian. They are shared across the region, and they call for shared responses.
Joining the ALF Network would allow us to connect our grassroots experience with a broader framework of intercultural exchange and cooperation. We want to learn from organisations working in similar contexts across the Euro-Mediterranean region, share the methodologies we have developed over more than a decade, and build partnerships that can strengthen and expand our social and artistic impact. We are also motivated by the Network's commitment to youth, gender and community development, three areas that sit at the heart of our work.
We have experienced first-hand the transformative power of this kind of connection by attending the Bokra Sawa Folding the Sea week-long workshop in Alexandria, Egypt. Working alongside practitioners from across the Euro-Mediterranean region, sharing methodologies, stories and visions, confirmed that the most meaningful work happens when we cross borders.
Additional Information
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