Jacinto Grau's “El señor de Pigmalión”

Abstract

IN SHAKESPEARE'S Hamlet, Tamayo y Baus' Un drama nuevo, and Ferenc Molnar's The Play's the Thing, a play takes place within a play, but the distinction between the two is always clear-cut. In Pirandello's Sei personaggi in cerca d'autore, based on an earlier story of his, there is a play within a play, but the line of demarcation between the reality of the live actors and that of the six created characters is completely lost. This fusion of reality with fantasy, and the independence of the created from the creator is seen also in Karel Capek's R. U.R. and Jacinto Grau's El seiror de Pigmali6n.1 All three plays were written in 1921. Although it has not had the world-wide recognition of the other two plays, Grau's has also had an illustrious career, and deserves wider recognition. It has been translated into French, Italian, Czech and English. The play, like many of don Jacinto's, was published (1921) before it was performed, and received its world premiere in a foreign country. It was presented in Paris in 1923 by Charles Dullin, in Prague in 1925 by Karel Capek, and in Italy (date unknown) by Luigi Pirandello. It did not reach Madrid till 1928, when the Melia-Cibrian company played it. As its name indicates, the story is based on the myth of Pygmalion and Galatea. From it Grau takes the fundamental idea of the creation of life from inorganic matter, and of the creator falling in love with the thing created. As in the Russian ballet Petrouchka, the animated objects are dolls.