FALL2007 135 Mexico City’s Spring 2007 Theatre Season TimothyG.Compton In accordance with José Joaquín Fernández de Lizardi’s philosophy that good literature should both teach and entertain, the best of Mexican theatre continues to do just that, as evidenced in Mexico City’s Spring 2007 season. And excellence was apparent in both adult and children’s theatre. Unfortunately, spectators had to be rather dedicated to seeing theatre, as they had to put up with last-minute schedule changes, poorly or inaccurately advertised offerings, and worst of all, a nasty dispute between the Instituto Cultural Helénico and the Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes, which kept spectators on the street until just before curtain time (crippling cafeteria and lobby snack bar business) at the several theaters of the Centro Cultural Helénico. Fortunately, dealing with the hassles was well worth it, as Mexico City’s abundant theatre offerings yielded numerous gems. One of the season’s finest plays was Historias de animales, performed in the diminutive Sala Rosario Castellanos in the Casa del Lago Juan José Arreola. Based on a story by Jaime Goded and adapted to theatre and directed by Edurne Goded, it was a stinging four-part farce which pummeled four different major aspects of Mexican society: government, the school system, the news media and commercialism. Those major categories, nevertheless , were merely the beginning, as within one hour it managed to skewer not just corrupt politicians, stupid teachers, self-interested reporters and hypermaterialist consumers, but also corrupt police officers and judges, bodyguards lacking brains but overly anxious for action, brutally incompetent medical doctors, outlandish sales sharks, dangerously incompetent drivers and gringo tourists toting monstrously large containers of beer, to mention a few of the most outstanding caricatures from the play. Several aspects of the play’s technique were brilliant, starting with the fact that the cast consisted of only four actors who obviously played numerous roles. Their wardrobe changed 136 LATINAMERICAN THEATRE REVIEW Historias de animales. Photo by Timothy G. Compton. as they sped from role to role, but more importantly, their body language, facial expressions , voices, rhythms and attitudes transformed them convincingly and hilariously. All four actors gave outstanding performances, but Héctor Dávila and Oscar Leonardo Yoldi shined brightest, perhaps because their roles allowed it of them. Unlike other plays I have seen in the same space, Historias de animales was oriented lengthwise, creating a very shallow stage, room for only three rows of spectators, and remarkable proximity to the audience. On each end of the actors’ space was a pair of coat trees laden with clothes at the beginning of the performance. Each change of character took place in full audience view, as actors discarded costumes and exchanged them for new ones. By the end of the play, the coat trees were bare. The costumes were sometimes realistic, as in the case of the reporters and police officers, but sometimes farcical, as in the cases of the gringo in Bermuda shorts and the politician who wore an elephant head. All props for the play were also at stage ends, ranging from multi-purpose boxes with inner lights on wheels which served as cars and other things, noise-makers, oversized money, cameras, mirrors, saw handles (for plastic surgery), guns and suitcases. Between the coat trees, the stage seemed to be split into thirds, signaled with rectangles of light which often illuminated a third of the stage at a time. At times the actors worked alone, while other times monologues yielded to dialogue. The language of the play was fast, tongue-in-cheek and dense, leaving at least one spectator with the desire to see the play again to process more of it. Language echoing conventions from the mass media was among the richest, having great fun at the expense of news programs and television commercials . One such commercial was for an “Air-Brain Damage Kit,” hawked by a woman who cheerfully declared: “Yo era una gorda, pero ahora soy popu- FALL2007 137 lar.” The TV-watcher immediately called for the ridiculous product, which led to a string of disasters for her. The use of lights, constant flow of characters...
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Jan 1, 2023
Shinji Takagi 
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