- “The Red Rose”: Pregones/Puerto Rican Traveling Theater (Photo by Krystal Photo by Krystal Conye)
Monsters, Ghosts, and Ancestors
Reflections on the 10th annual El Cuentro Festival, hosted by Latino Theatre Company
By Amanda L. Andrei
“Yamel Cucuy” (Photo courtesy of Glass Half Full)
A light touch of the hand, and a little girl transforms into a skeleton. A stranger arrives for a singing lesson, only to dissolve everything that he and the teacher knew about the deceased love of their lives. And mental illness and vulnerability becomes an opportunity for the dead to speak to the living. This year’s iteration of Encuentro, which closed last week, was a national festival of theater hosted by Latino Theater Company. It provided audiences with a wide range of theatrical styles and stories, tied together by a deep inquiry into the nature of death, memory, and ancestors.
Its fitting theme the weekend that I attended coincided with Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), All Saints’ Day, and All Souls’ Day. A large ofrenda graced the lobby of the Los Angeles Theatre Center, resplendent with marigolds and vintage photos on its altar top and a large monarch butterfly stretching above them. In the festival’s tenth anniversary, it hosted 19 theater companies and 165 artists, as well as Howl Round’s Latinx Theatre Commons.
“La Golondrina” (Photo by Michael Palma)
New York-based Repertorio Español’s La Golondrina by Guillem Clua portrayed a simple and brilliant confrontation between new student Ramón (Rafa Sánchez) and singing teacher Amelia (Zulema Clares) as the two strangers divulged their shared grief and love over a young man killed in a mass shooting at a gay bar. Ismanuel Rodríguez’s potent direction charged up this two-hander drama as Ramón and Amelia forced each other to uncover their wounds. Sánchez and Clares were so present—each breath, eye twitch, and hand-wringing so precise—that audience members could be heard sobbing during the performance.
It’s a stark stylistic contrast jumping into Yamel Cucuy, a folkloric- and horror movie-inspired political dramedy rife with puppets, masks, and a moving set, produced by Glass Half Full Theatre from Austin, Texas. The emotional electricity of loss and love was just as intense as Caroline Reck deftly directed a spirited ensemble of immigrant family members and cucuy (monsters). The adolescent girl Yamel (Gricelda Silva) hid from immigration officers but perished in the process. Her spirit then journeyed through the nine Aztec underworld levels of Mictlán to find her new purpose. Extensive puppetry and costuming (Connor Hopkins, Indigo Rael, Caroline Reck, Annie Ulrich) evoked frissons of fear and delight. Paired with K. Eliot Hayne’s intricate and frightening sound design, they conveyed a frightening and unstable afterlife, yet one that promised reunification and retribution.
“Blanco Temblor” (Photo by Raquel Vasquez)
From San Juan, Puerto Rico came Teatro Público’s Blanco Temblor written and directed by Carola García López, detailing the life of Marina del Mar (a charming and sensitive Gabriela Saker), a bipolar astrophysicist with an odd congenital condition that leaves her unable to tremble. With humor and warmth, López also portrayed Marina’s mother and grandmother, shifting between adulthood, old age, and a deceased ancestor presence that could be interpreted a dream or figment of the imagination, but that I also understood as real and part of the astrophysicist’s waking life (given the play’s collage-like structure). As the protagonist’s loving friend and colleague, Irene, Laura Isabel Cabrera also delivered a standout comedic performance as the zany Dra. Eva Riefhold who examined Marina to make sense of her maladies.
“Ayotzinapa” (Photo by Matias Ponce)
L.A.-based Grupo de Teatro SINERGIA’s Ayotzinapa (Situación: Desaparecido) written and directed by Ruben Amavizca-Murúa utilized news sources and an ensemble cast in this docudrama about the 2014 disappearance of 43 student teachers from the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers’ College in Iguala, Mexico, an event of mass violence that has remained unsolved and continues to distress survivors and family members ten years later. Ensemble members took on the roles of various community members who eulogized the 43 young men, remembering their nicknames, likes and dislikes, and mannerisms in the community. White cutouts with Sharpie’d names and xeroxed faces of the deceased were carefully lined up onstage, resembling a cemetery full of headstones. The urgency and reverence for the students is commendable, though the tight space of the theater and the loud, pounding sound of a prison door for each desaparecido started to numb the emotional message towards the end.
“La Vida Es Sueño” (Photo: Courtesy of Bilingual Foundation of the Arts)
The famous Spanish Golden Age La Vida Es Sueño by Pedro Calderón de la Barca, performed by Bilingual Foundation of the Arts from L.A., transported the audience to a 17th century Spanish take on the illusions of fate, justice, and governance. Directed by Liane Schirmer, the prince Segismundo (a truculent Erich Wildpret) has spent his life imprisoned in a tower at the decree of his father, King Basilio (an austere Sergio Lanza), who believed his son would grow up to be a tyrant. When Basilio swaps his son back into the palace, chaos ensues from Segismundo’s justifiable rage at being denied his human and royal rights. Juxtaposing the Ciglo de Oro play against contemporary works was a fascinating curatorial choice, as it provided an opportunity to reflect on how far (or not) society has come with regards to the capricious nature of politics and brutal family relationships.
Pregones/Puetro Rican Traveling Theater from the Bronx, New York, offers the musical The Red Rose, written and directed by Rosalba Rolón, about the life of Afro-Puerto Rican activist and writer Jesús Colón. José Joaquín García inhabited with vigor this historical figure and father of the Nuyorican movement, with a lively Mario Mattei taking on his writer alter-ego, Miquis Tiquis. While the story got muddled and episodic at times, the live band (Desmar Guevara, Alvaro Benavides, Camilo Molina, and Sergio Reyes) at front and center kept the momentum rolling. The production provided an opportunity to expand the idea of ancestors beyond blood relations, lauding historical figures who may not be recognized in the mainstream.
As the Saturday evening shows closed and melted into a celebration in the LATC lobby, people vibrated with excitement from the shows they’ve just seen, hugging old friends and greeting new ones. The monster puppets from Yamel Cucuy appeared and danced — what were formerly harbingers of death onstage were now fellow partygoers on the floor. It felt apt for this journey through Encuentro — that even if death and memory are fraught, to twirl with our monsters and face our fears can make living more worthwhile.
