"They have been saying goodbye for years," an anonymous grumbled on the networks about the news: The Tricicle says goodbye to the stages, in Barcelona, with five performances – "there are no tickets" – at the Gran Teatre del Liceu (26, 28, 30 of this month, December 2 and 4), where they make their big debut, like the one who gets married in El Escorial, grown up like kids, with Chimpum! Or chimpun, as Arniches would say.
-It is better to say: up to here...
Carles Sans is the most loquacious of the three, practitioners of the perfect marriage (“a chain so heavy that it often takes three to carry it”, said Dumas or Wilde, who cares).
The farewell consists of five acts, with a packed Liceu and an intergenerational audience, such as the Flash-Flash tortilla shop, where grandparents and grandchildren share a table.
The confusion about the farewells has an explanation and Paco Mir gives it: Bits was presented in 2013 as his last production –and it was–, but then came Hits. Chimpun, a medley, as a farewell-farewell, scheduled for March 2020 and whose promotion was made, but not the functions due to the pandemic. "And we returned all the tickets", clarifies Joan Gràcia in case there is anyone suspicious.
In summary: The Tricicle leaves because they feel like it, not to be sorry, sell tickets and shed many tears.
The Tricicle looks back but in that way because they leave behind and are useful men with projects. "At the beginning of our career (back in 1982) we asked for a grant and it was denied," they explain. And so until today, oblivious to the labyrinth of public aid and its easements. Something isn't right about it. “In France they have a good system. The VAT for the first functions is 3% but after a certain number – which confirms that the work is successful – they raise it. The essential thing is to help those who are just starting out”, says Joan Gràcia.
The mark of El Tricicle is humor with manners – very little Iberian – and capable of resisting the puritanical wave of political correctness. And cross borders, as a cheesy would say. “We have laughed, for example, at the passengers on the airlift without –when they saw the show– they felt alluded to”, says Paco Mir. Neither concerned nor offended.
They have not created a school or had imitators, unlike Raphael. "It's true," says Sans. And when an actor has done numbers like the one with the croquette, no, it hasn't finished working ”. Here is a merit of the trio: simplicity, pretending that we could all be them and –on top of that– without gluing or stamping. The stage within the reach of all Spaniards...
If there is any downside to a successful career, it is the cinema. They starred in Palace, a film with a script but no words, from 1995, long before the success of two silent films –but with subtitles–: The Artist, Oscar for best film in 2011, and Snow White by Pablo Berger (2012). Of course: Jean Rochefort, co-star, includes it among his best films. “Cinema ends up being a genre where many, too many rule, intervene and influence, unlike theater”, they comment.
The Spanish state and its capital have rewarded them before and more times than in Catalonia, but they are far from complaining. Having a public –and faithful– here, who wants the cross of Alfonso X El Sabio? Things of Catalonia.
It hurts them more to admit that Madrid pampers the theatrical business, unlike Barcelona, where the administrations are picky and somewhat pejorative, to the point that they rejected their interest in the Palacio del Cinema, since it is less than a hundred meters from the Borrás.
Carles Sans has 2023 cool with his Finally alone! . Paco Mir prepares a one-on-one with Lope de Vega at the Poliorama (and Joan Gràcia is going to open branches of his successful Lío de Eivissa. Here, the only ones screwed are Manolo and Ramón, the Dynamic Duo, who made cash for copyrights every time the bars of I am a knave, I am a gentleman sounded...
