About the work
Dario Fo's farce „Can't Pay? Won't Pay!" („Non si paga! Non si paga!") was premiered in Milan in 1974. Against a background of inflation and rising prices, it tells of the revolt of ordinary people against the high cost of living. Fo combines turbulent comedy of errors with robust political satire.
Plot
In a Milan working-class district the housewives rebel against unaffordable food prices and promptly loot a supermarket — they take the goods and „simply don't pay". Antonia and her neighbour Margherita must hide the haul from Antonia's law-abiding husband Giovanni and from the police. In ever more absurd manoeuvres they stuff the food under their coats and feign pregnancies. A policeman, an undertaker and all manner of complications drive up the pace. Behind the slapstick the play deals with concrete themes: wage cuts, housing shortage, consumer refusal and working-class solidarity — until at last even the initially upright husbands grasp the logic of the protest.
Cultural significance
„Can't Pay? Won't Pay!" is one of Fo's most-performed farces and a model of his political popular theatre, which unites laughter and class struggle. The play has been translated into countless languages and repeatedly adapted to current economic crises. It belongs to the international repertoire of comic social theatre.