Josep María Flotats | Josep María Flotats: “‘Paris 1940’ shocks more because there is panic before the imminence of a world war”

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Josep Maria Flotats, actor, stage director, made in Paris for the theater, now one of the great masters of the European scenehe was like a boy on Wednesday, January 11 because the next day he was going to turn 84 and he was going to celebrate with his family in Barcelona, ​​where he was born.

I was also radiant because paris 1940, the work that has been on display at the Spanish Theater, has resulted in a public success that is not usual on these dates of border years. Apart from being a theater lesson that is canonical in the history of dramaturgy, the piece reflects contemporary concerns despite the time that the material of its writing has taken on itself, transferred to Spanish by Mauro Ermine.

The work reflects the value of one of the great dramatists of the 20th century, the French Louis Jouvetwho continued rehearsing the Don Juan by Moliere even when the Nazis put the swastika on the workplace of director and actors in a theater in Paris. And now, in its Spanish revival (it was done here before, in 1993 and 2002), it has caused the stupor that does not cease over the barbarism to which Hitler wanted to submit Europe.

That swastika that marked the passage of the German dictator through the world that was devastating dominates the scene very soon, and there it is, until the end, when Natalia Huartethe young actress who rehearses for the demanding Jouvet (in this case, Flotats) the decisive part of that work by Molière, finally says the most complex part of her speech to the taste of the demanding director.

The outcome of the rehearsal process, and of the work, is a picture whose emotion is now born from the fact that many of the persecutions that then shook the foundations of Europe (and the world) are dangerously recreated in different countries on European soil.

During this conversation with Flotats (who has staged A private day, the misanthrope o Until, who has a huge number of other dramatic challenges behind him, and who is now thinking of new possible challenges or not so much around figures like Josep Pla or Voltaire and Rosseau) the actor who plays Jouvet evokes his own life as a son of that time, because his parents were republicans retaliated by Spanish fascism. And at one point in that memory, when he was about to turn 84, he could not contain his emotion and there we saw him enduring the tears that come from a period that is impossible to forget in theater and in life.

About those symbols that the world has not erased our questions begin.

The swastika warns of the danger that surrounds us. […] Well, every night I see that horrible flag and I get goosebumps. Even aesthetically it makes me nauseous. I feel attacked”

Q. That symbol that suddenly bursts into the work is still overwhelming today. What does that symbol produce for you?

R. The swastika warns of the danger that surrounds us. Some German military hymns are heard and a janitor gives the Nazi salute. In other words: it is to place the viewer in a dark, dangerous and worrying environment or climate. Well, every night I see that horrible flag and I get goosebumps. Even aesthetically it makes me nauseous. I feel attacked. But… at the same time, I hope the audience feels the same way. Because that will mean that there is a rejection of all that.

Q. Suddenly the swastika looms over the reality of Paris and…

R. And the protagonist says something like: ‘with everything that is happening, I have lost the work that I had done inside myself. I have no feelings, I feel completely blocked.’ But deep down she does not lose hope. She knows that they too, the Nazis, will pass. And she concentrates on her art because that is a way of resisting. I think that’s the overall message of the play. In a few words, she tells herself everything: ‘you have to keep going, you have to keep going to get better.’

Q. The teacher tells the actress to dare more, but one as a spectator feels that she is afraid.

R. Yes Yes. And, you know, when we were rehearsing I asked that the flag not be lowered. They only lowered it in the penultimate rehearsal because you had to see how the light hit it, so that it was well illuminated. But… it was better not to see her. It was like seeing evil and you didn’t have to be tormented ahead of time, right? Once you start, well… you have to do it.

Perhaps I am more shocked now than at other times because there is a feeling that we are at the gates of World War III. And I want to reflect that panic.”

Q. It’s true: just with that flag, evil is taking root in the work and among the spectators.

R. I have done this work three times. I did it first in Barcelona, ​​in Catalan, in 1993. Then in Madrid in 2002. And this is the third time. In other words: they are different times. And perhaps I am more shocked now than at other times because there is a feeling that we are at the gates of World War III. And I want to reflect that panic. And that terrible threat. Let’s say that today there is a certain similarity with the Second World War: the economy is going down, there are energy problems… everything seems to be preparing a logical consequence: war. Well, it can’t be. It just can’t be. My weapon is the theater and with the theater I have to fight to make people aware. That is why I have reassembled this work. Because our trade is a serious commitment. The theater is not only the hihijí or hahaha.

Q. So this work is more real now than in 1993 and 2002.

R. Yes, definitely. What happens is that when I did it in 2002 there was no threat of a world war and… I didn’t feel the theater was in danger, as I’ve felt in recent years. In other words: it was just a tribute to my roots. morning [por el 11 de enero] I am going to turn 84 and I don’t know what awaits me, but it is clear that I already have fewer years ahead of me than I had 20 years ago. It’s obvious, isn’t it? So I need to thank my teachers and the public and everything that has allowed me to build myself as an actor. That is also why I have re-assembled this work. I went to Strasbourg thanks to a scholarship. It was fantastic, I had extraordinary teachers who, when they found out that my scholarship was only for one year, interceded for me to renew it and so that I could continue studying. But it turns out that the Spanish embassy advised against keeping me there because, literally, ‘it is not good for a Spaniard to spend more than a year outside of Spain, because he can acquire ideas contrary to the regime.’

Q. Damn.

R. But the rector replied to the embassy that Franco was not in charge in France, and that he had also been resistant and, I told them, “we have won.” And that’s it, there was no need for more. I finished studying and then I went to Paris and… things began to chain together. I was lucky or what do I know. He was a good student, yes, but also… Let’s see: I have never managed to get my father to talk about the war. He only told me once that he participated in the battle of the Ebro, on the Republican side. He told me: “I have seen the Ebro red with blood.” And my mother told me that my father came home one day in a rag and that he only said: “We lost.” [silencio y se emociona].

Flotats culminated a few days ago the functions of his latest work in Madrid, ‘Paris 1940’. ALBA VIGARAY


Q. These testimonies have perhaps boosted the vigor of your relationship with the scene.

R. Yes. I am telling you this so that you understand that when I look back, I see that I have had scholarships and such, but I have also met people with similar stories. The rector of Strasbourg had participated in the Resistance, for example. And… look at him: my father did not lose. My father won thanks to this rector. So Paris, 1940 it is also a tribute to people like him. And to the teachers who have trained me who, in one way or another, have had to do with that situation.

Q. There is a moment in the play when you are only Louis Jouvet on stage, not so much Flotats. What does being Jouvet oblige you to do?

R. It forces me to forget about myself totally. Because what I say is not new to me, they are phrases that Jouvet’s disciples have been repeating to me. That’s why I have to be an excellent transmitter. I am the messenger and I do not exist and… that is my commitment and my duty. Jouvet said that there are two ways of doing theater: on the surface and in depth. This will to do well, to go better, to more, is what has formed me. That is why at that moment I am only the voice of Jouvet. I believe in the text, I believe so much in the text that it flows in me and I just let it out.

I come from a time when works were done with great care. Before, if the theater was private, the owner lived in the same building and if you went at 10 in the morning, you would find him removing or putting up a sign or cleaning something”

Q. There is a phrase by Jouvet that says: “comfort is the death of the artist.” Do you see that in the contemporary scene?

R. Well yes, unfortunately. I see comfort. There is almost no commitment from the artist. Lack. But… not so much because of the interpreters or the directors, but because of the system. The administrative-economic system that makes production impossible. I still think that a place that is a theater and that sometimes has three or even four shows on sale in a single day… does not have the quality and rigor of before. Sometimes because there are not enough technicians, sometimes because the sets are small and have to be moved, sometimes because the spotlights are not enough and they also have to be moved… In other words: there is not the necessary care or care. I come from a time when works were done with great care. Before, if the theater was private, the owner lived in the same building and if you went at 10 in the morning, you would find him removing or putting up a poster or a photo or cleaning something. That’s another thing! Look: when in Paris I was hired to do a play about euthanasia, the director told me: “Simone Berriot wants to see you.” I went, she was the owner and she lived upstairs. Her servant asked me to wait in a room full of photos and then took me to a room where a lady was in bed wearing a hat and a veil. It was a 90-year-old lady, or something like that, she asked me to sit on her bed and she took me by the hand and told me fantastic stories about all those who had passed through her theater, and at the end she tells me: “Don’t think that because I’m in bed I won’t see it.” It turns out that next to the bed she had a window and she opened it and from there you could see the stage! It was like a fourth floor, I think, and from there every night I watched the shows. Isn’t that love of the theater?

Q. Jouvet’s fifth lesson coincides with the entry of the Nazis into Paris. What tension did you want to transfer to the stage at that moment?

R. Remember the end of our war and transmit an internal imbalance. An iron will to continue working without knowing if we will be able to reach the end of the class. That. I met many people in France who had lived through the Occupation and they told me about it, about how they saw people being taken by force to the concentration camps. I also met Jorge Semprún a lot in Paris and he told me about that barbarity. So… I tried to think of all that and all of them to make this work.

[En ese final, cuando la esvástica sigue en pie y en la espalda del abrigo de la actriz que representa la joven Natalia Huarte se ve impuesta la Estrella de David, el símbolo de los judíos, el patio de butacas saltó como un resorte, como si la emoción que se fue incubando en la sala del Español a lo largo de la representación convirtiera los aplausos en un himno de la Resistencia].

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