A sea of foam greets the spectator when immersed in the show Viatge d'hivern (o quan Jelinek va deixar de playing Schubert), based on the work of Elfriede Jelinek. We say based because the Austrian playwright, Nobel Prize for Literature in 2004, writes theatrical texts that immediately have to go through the dramaturgical creation of whoever wants to put them on stage.
On this occasion, it has been Magda Puyo and Marc Villanueva who have accepted the challenge, and he has also done the translation and she has directed it. On October 5 it will be released in the Beckett room, where it opens the season.
Laia Alberch, Pepo Blasco, Rosa Cadafalch, Clara Peya and Encarni Sànchez bring Jelinek's characters to life. "The work presents the coldness, the difficulty, the violence of living for the human condition," explains Toni Casares, director of the Beckett.
Many things in today's society are questioned, such as dependence on social networks: "We are a fucking telephone booth," says the character of the dancer Encarni Sànchez. Or fascism: "We are delighted to stand up to the outcome of the elections in Italy with our small contribution," says Casares. We have to put a mirror before the shit in which we are installed, no matter how white it is, ”he says in reference to the foam, which loses volume as the show progresses.
Puyo dedicates the play “to Iranian women”, and explains that one of the characters says: “I am a woman and nothing belongs to me”. The director wants to make Jelinek's work known “because it is unknown”, and mentions the film Haneke's Pianist, with Isabelle Huppert, as the one that people know the most about her. "It's very ironic and harsh, and there's irony and hopelessness, farce, intimate drama and music in the play."
A piece of music written and performed by Clara Peya, who says: “The music is not all mine. I wondered if I perverted Schubert or not. 80% is not Schubert and 20% is Schubert pasado por mi cedazo". Viatge d'hivern is a co-production between Beckett and Cassandra Projectes Artístics, and can be seen in the Poblenou theater until October 30.
Catalan version, here
