“Lorca, Living The Experience” reviewed by Julia W. Rath

[rating=2]Something got lost in the translation of “Lorca, Living the Experience”, a theatrical show dramatized in Spanish with English titles. Based on the stories, poems, and music by Andalusian writer Federico García Lorca, this melodrama was conceived and directed by Iraida Tapias, whose point was to explicate the horror of violence, so as to expound on the need for human rights and human dignity. Specifically, the presentation consists of a series of vignettes, based on Lorca’s short stories, detailing women’s lives in early 20th century Spain. For the most part, the show spells out how there is no way for a woman to escape her fate of lowly physical labor, marriage, birthing babies, and eventually dying. Yet the main theme of the show is freedom, where death is the ultimate escape from this painful world. The unspoken truth behind the stories is that this depressing reality can and must change worldwide.

Hosted by the Chicago affiliate of the Instituto de Cervantes, this production by the Water People Theater Company is not without its faults. For starters, watching this show can problematic if one does not know Spanish. To make up for this, there are two monitors on either side of the stage, with English translations of the text and the song lyrics. While the word choice is intriguing (assuming that the translation into English is faithful), I nevertheless found it hard to simultaneously read the titles, keep track of the various characters, and follow the action. Considering I had no previous familiarity with Lorca’s works, I felt that I lacked some foundation for understanding this performance. Since there are no physical programs (and no QR code for reference to an electronic program), an uninitiated theatregoer with little or no knowledge of Spanish literature probably doesn’t have enough background to figure out exactly what is going on. I didn’t know whether the component short stories (i.e., “The Shoemaker’s Prodigious Wife”, “Doña Rosita the Spinster”, “Blood Wedding”, “The House of Bernarda Alba”, “Yerma”, and “Mariana Pineda”) are based on actual or exaggerated situations that once existed. It would have helped to ground the performance using a card at the beginning of each vignette, with the title of each short story, the place and year when it took place, and a sentence or two about its context. The cast includes Carlota Sosa Bernarda Alba), Rebeca Aleman (Yerma, Mariana Pineda, pianist), Ana Santos (The Mother, Neighbor, First Washer-Woman, singer), Kris Tori, (Doña Rosita, The Bride, Second Washer-Woman), and Teresa Echeveste (The Shoemaker’s Wife, Third Washer-Woman, understudy).

The songs in Spanish plus Spanish-themed music provide some of the highlights of the show. I especially liked the singing of tenor Camilo Rasquinas well as the performance of Andrea Salcedo on guitar. Other highlights include the projection design and art direction. The work of Oliver Krisch, Mafer Rodriguez, and Marisabel Munoz is nicely done, with all sorts of scenery and fabric and tile patterns—and even the tatting of a veil—being projected along three walls of the stage. However, there is perhaps a problem with the translation. The advance piece states: “Through video mapping, the audience will be immersed in the world of flamenco.” Unfortunately, the flamenco dancing (choreographed by Irene Sivianes) is minimal, and the audience is definitely not immersed, according to the definition of immersive theatre today. Rather, it is the actors, singers, and musicians who become a part of the projection design and this has nothing to do with the audience whatsoever. (FYI: Video mapping has more to do with how the video work itself is being created and not how it is being projected.)

Halfway into the show, the monitor to the right of the stage cut off half of the first letter of each word on the left margin; but the first letter could easily be inferred, or one could look at the monitor on the left. It wasn’t a problem for me to constantly turn my head to view the screens and then back to the action on stage; and my guess is that the organizers sat many of the native Spanish-speakers towards the back of the hall, since they didn’t need to take advantage of the monitors. Note that the sound mix was sometimes off, and the music occasionally overshadowed the singing voices.

All in all, the show consists of various writings by Federico García Lorca separated by visual effects and music. But the entire collection of short stories became much too blurred in my mind to distinguish among them, thus making the presentation seem too disjointed. From my perspective, most of the show seems overly dramatized, but this might be culturally appropriate in Spanish theatre. Perhaps if I had previously read Lorca’s original works, then the dreariness of his themes about death, dying, despair, and the dead might have been made more approachable. But watching a 65-minute show largely about women’s lives having little or no purpose made this a difficult slog, and it became overwhelming. I was especially disappointed by the relative absence of flamenco. Hence the performance did not meet my expectations. I felt I couldn’t overcome my lack of Spanish language skills, especially when it came to understanding the various nuances in the presentation. Maybe this show works better for those already familiar with Spanish literature not in translation. If your native language is Spanish, you will probably get more out of seeing this show than if you are an English speaker who knows only a smattering of Spanish, even with the titles in English right in front of us.

“Lorca, Living the Experience” played on Wednesday, May 25th at the Instituto Cervantes of Chicago, 31 W. Ohio Street, in Chicago’s River North area. There will be one additional performance on Wednesday, June 1, 2022, at 7:00 p.m.

Tickets are: $25 – $30, and are on sale now at https://waterpeople.org/.

Remember that COVID requirements can change at any moment. That said, the Instituto de Cervantes was the first venue I’ve traveled to in and around Chicago and Cook County where wearing masks was optional, and they did not check vaccination cards. Just a handful of us in the crowded audience chose to wear a mask, including myself and my guest. Note that as of today (May 26th), Chicago is now in the high risk category for COVID transmission. I don’t know how this may affect the performance on June 1st, with regard to whether everybody will be required to wear a mask indoors.