Danza Abierta de la Universidad de Costa Rica

On Thursday 25th July, we went to watch a different kind of performance to the ones that we are used to, a dance performance. It was absolutely a different, unique experience because dancers, in comparison to actors, only focus on movements. Actors, on the other hand, have to divide all their energy into actions, face expression, voice, etc.

Nevertheless, I found some similarities between actors and dancers. For example, breathing. After watching this performance I understood the importance of breathing, something Roberto taught us long time ago. It was impressive to actually hear the performers breathe before making a new movement. Breathing was their source of energy.

The performance, directed by Rogelio López, was divided into 3 dances: Prohibido adentrarse en el bosque, Pulsión, Érase una vez un Árbol. They were all aggressive. To me, the most impressive dance, and my favorite one was Pulsión, because all dancers were onstage at the same time during all the performance. This proved that they had to work a lot on their energy to present this almost-10 minutes long performance. The choreography was very interesting, but they needed some more practice. The mistakes they made could have been because of the nervousness (this was their first show in Lima), but they still were very coordinated.

Érase una vez un Árbol, presented the themes of death, the lost of someone you really appreciate and admire. This was influenced by the death of María Cristina Gigirey, maestra de danza. Thus, the dance was aggressive and full of fast, strong movements. In this part of the presentation I realized that sometimes dancers, as actors, also used face expression to accompany their movements.

Some of the movements involved more than one performer. We could see how, for example, the couple of dancers placed in the right part of the stage did one movement, and then, after a couple of minutes, we could see the same choreography repeated by the other two couples. The amount of team work portrayed in the dance was remarkable.

Apart from the movements and the energy of the dancers, what I found interesting were the costumes. In the first presentation they appeared with black robes, which could be used in different ways. When they were representing trees, they used some clothes made of latex which made it more elastic.

In conclusion, I loved watching dances for a change and I couldn’t help myself for comparing actors and dancers. I wonder, if we add words to a dance, would it make it a theatrical representation? How different are actors from dancers? Do dancers need more energy than actors? Are the 3 principles for rehearsal the same for actors and dancers?

Respira

Last week we went to watch Respira at Teatro Britanico. It was a play written by Eduardo Adrianzén and directed by Roberto Ángeles. I was expecting it to be an incredible play, because I heard wonderful comments about it, but I got a little disappointed.

On the one hand, there were good things about Respira. The script was very well written. The story was narrated by a boy called Mario, in the present 40 years old. He talked about his family and their life in Lima on the 70s. His mother was religious and his father was a socialist atheist. ‘El conflicto de la obra es la dificultad de creer’ – Eduardo Adrianzén. This was exposed by, for example, the different ideas Mario's parents poured into his mind. He didn't know who to believe because the things his mother told him about religion was the oppposite of what his father told him.

These contradictions makes Mario create a different type of Jesus in his mind. Cristo, played by Renzo Shuller, was my favorite character and a total plus to the play. He was not the Jesus that we all know, but his a rebel, he likes fighting and talks about revenge. Roberto told me that he thought that Jesus was a little bit fat, but I thought that was the way he had to be, to add to the idea of contradiction. We all have the image of Jesus being a tall, skinny man, so watching a short fat guy playing a rebelious Jesus, to me it maked sense.

Oher thing that maked the play interesting, was the comedy. We are presented these too kids, Mario and Walter, in their first look to sexuality. The character of the priest was full of greed which adds to the contradiction of what people normaly expects, and what Mario experiences and imagines. Additionally, taking into account the scenery, I liked the idea of the rolling thingy on one corner of the stage and the images projected in the background wall, which changed the place the actions were happening.

On the other hand, there were things that, in my opinion, didn't work in this play. First of all, Mario was supposed to be the youngest child in his family. He had an older brother, Renato, yet Leonardo Torres Vilar (the actor playing Mario) had beard which made it imposible for audience, at least me, to believe that he was younger thatn his brother. Furthermore, I really did not understand the purposes of both Mario’s parents giving a speech of more than 5 minutes each, explaining their lives’ frustrations. I didn’t care about that. In my opinion it only made the play go slower. Overall, I didn’t love the play. It was not for a specific reason, I just didn’t enjoy it.

Roberto told me that he loved the script but the direction, thus the performance, was not as good. So I wonder, do we sometimes waste good scripts by giving not so good performances? What does it take to give a performance that is at the same level as the script? Can we give an excellent preformance with a bad text? How much of the quality of the performance rely on the script?