For the first time in Italy, Kuro Tanino, one of Japan's most celebrated contemporary theater directors, presents Fortress of Smile together with his company Niwa Gekidan Penino. The director-dramaturg paints a voyeuristic slice of life about two small and neglected adjacent apartments in a coastal village. Hyperrealist rooms and sets become the stage for two parallel, intertwined stories. On the one hand, a few lively fishermen meet daily to drink and have a good time; on the other, an elderly woman – aided by her son and granddaughter – comes to terms with old age and loneliness. Following the unchanging routine of these lives, we gradually realize that something is changing. A poetic and radical performance suspended between humor and surreal situations.