DNA – La doppia elica di una doppia storia

Lesson/show by and with Guido Barbujani and Chiara Tessiore

The discovery of DNA is one of the most exciting scientific adventures of the twentieth century.
A story that starts slowly, transforming into a whirlwind race where laboratories and scientists compete to attach their names to a discovery destined to forever change modern biology: the existence of a molecule responsible for the transmission of hereditary traits; DNA, our “instruction manual”.

In this original lesson-show, the geneticist and writer Guido Barbujani explains what DNA is, how it works, how it replicates, and why it is the basis of life for all living beings. Alongside him, actress and storyteller Chiara Tessiore intertwines another narrative: that of Rosalind Franklin and the famous “Photo 51,” the image that provided decisive proof of the DNA structure. A “stolen” photograph, which still today questions the relationship between science, recognition, and power. The story of Franklin and her missed Nobel Prize embodies what is now defined as the “Matilda Effect”: the mechanism by which the scientific contributions of women are often forgotten, downplayed, or attributed to others.
In a tight dialogue between scientific dissemination and theatrical narration, Barbujani and Tessiore
reconstruct the way in which science takes shape: among intuitions, daring hypotheses, or
methodical caution; between those who rush towards the “Eureka” and those who, even with the
decisive proof before their eyes, hesitate to take the final step.

The double helix — today one of the most recognizable symbols of contemporary culture, from school textbooks to WhatsApp emojis — thus becomes the meeting point between two intertwined stories: that of the discovery that has forever changed our understanding of life, and that of those who contributed to making it possible.