Bruna Fachetti (Photo by James William)
Reviewed by Julia Stier
The Broadwater Black Box Theatre
Through August 1
Bruna Fachetti (Photo by James William)
“Only I, her author, love her.”
The Hour of the Star is adapted from Brazilian author Clarice Lispector’s novella of the same name. The show features Bruna Fachetti in a solo turn, and has been conceived and directed by Alex Tietre.
Originally published in 1977, the novel follows a writer, Rodrigo, as he pens the story of Macabéa, a young typist from the Northeast region of Brazil, as she struggles to find her way in a classist, sexist world amidst heartbreak, betrayal, and poverty.
Fachetti starts out as Rodrigo, clacking away at an imaginary typewriter and informing us that he will be playing out the story as he writes it – inhabiting the characters in order to do them justice.
There’s the aforementioned Macabéa, whose two defining traits are that she is a “typist and a virgin;” Olímpico, her quasi-boyfriend; Glória, her classy, Rio-born coworker; the prescient Madama Carlota; and the “cheap” Doctor whom Macabéa receives a deadly diagnosis from.
A single, high-backed rolling office chair serves as the one set piece; cleverly equipped with two lights, it serves as a chair, an x-ray machine, and even as the car that brings Macabéa to her untimely death.
Fachetti tackles each role with a different set of intonations and physical gestures, signaling each change to the audience with surprising ease.
However, while embodying six distinctly different characters is no small feat – and one that Fachetti deserves her flowers for – the breakneck pace with which she switches between two of these characters in conversation can make tracking the content of their discourse hard to follow. With a runtime under an hour, there’s surely space to let the dialogue breathe.
The moments where Fachetti thrives are the ones where she sits in just one persona for a beat, most prominently illustrated when she steps into the role of Madama Carlota, the fortune teller.
The Hour of the Star serves as a fascinating study in the art of portraying multiple characters, as well as a bite-sized intro to one of Brazil’s most beloved writers.
THE HOUR OF THE STAR The Broadwater Blackbox Theater, 6322 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood. Thurs.-Sun., 7 pm; thru Aug. 1. thehourofthestar.eventbrite.com. Runtime: 55 minutes with no intermission.
