2023-09-18 18:50:50
THEATER CRITICISM
‘The Wars of Our Ancestors’, a 1975 novel, which had its first theatrical version in 1980 adapted by Delibes himself, returns to the stage by Claudio Tolcachir
Carmelo Gómez and Miguel Hermoso Goya theater
A Miguel Delibes the adaptations suit him well, whether to the cinema – ‘The Road’, ‘The Disputed Vote of Mr. Cayo, ‘The Rats’, ‘The Holy Innocents’ – or to the theater: ‘Five Hours with Mario’, ‘Lady in Red with a Gray Background’ or ‘ The wars of our ancestors’. This 1975 novel, which had its first theatrical version in 1980 adapted by Delibes himself, returns to the stage by Claudio Tolcachir from the adaptation by Eduardo Galán.
Author: Miguel Delibes. Theatrical adaptation: Eduardo Galán. Director: Claudio Tolcachir. Set design: Mónica Boromello. Lighting: Juan Gómez Cornejo. Performers: Carmelo Gómez, Miguel Hermoso. Place: Goya Theater.
The dialogue form of the novel facilitates its dramaturgical translation. A dim setting accentuates the confessional tone of Pacífico Pérez with the psychiatrist who records the dialogues in the prison where he is serving his sentence.
Carmelo Gomez He takes advantage of his Leonese accent to highlight the rurality of Pacífico, a man who lives up to his name: an archetype of so many Spaniards who found themselves immersed in wars that they did not understand, but who ended up charting a fateful destiny. Pacífico remembers the conflicts that his great-grandfather (El Bisa), grandfather (El Abue) and his father told him about to compose a popular version of the Carlist, African and 1936 wars. Pacífico could be the Hispanic incarnation of the boy from ‘El Grass’s tin drum; but, unlike little Óskar, he lacks perversity and drum. He will stoically endure being accused of being a sissy and a coward for not showing the warrior ardor of his ancestors. The man who showed himself incapable of learning to hate in order to maintain the tradition that Goya painted in his ‘Duel with clubs’, here is the paradox of a sad existence, ends up in prison accused of homicide.
When a work was preceded by other adaptations, we think of the Pacific that it embodied Jose Sacristan more than thirty years ago, runs the risk of hateful comparisons. This is not the case of these “wars of our ancestors”; The work of Carmelo Gómez and Miguel Hermoso shines for its rapport and the contrast between the man who does not want to fight to save his life and the psychiatrist determined to free him from such a tragic fate. A moral lesson against the “hysterical” memory that once sponsored the right and today encourages the left. Delibes, always current.
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