The premiere of the play “Sin Sangre” in 2007 marked the birth of the TeatroCinema company, thus beginning an artistic path towards a new theatrical aesthetic; a new language, in which theater is masterfully fused with cinematographic elements.
This new theatrical language dilutes the border between the performers and the different planes, backgrounds, digital compositions and scenography, enveloping the viewer in the visual poetry of the story.
According to what was stated by Juan Carlos Zagal and Laura Pizarro (stable cast of the company), with “Sin Sangre” a new way of doing theater is inaugurated, which lies in creating a fusion between the virtual and the physical.
“No one teaches how to do theater, theater has to be invented by the group, the company. We seek to captivate the viewer, creating a parallel world, (…) we seek to make what is happening as organic as possible, mastering the technique, at the service of the story,” the company comments.
The creative processes of the company’s productions are described by Laura Pizarro as “a blank sheet that begins to take shape, depending on the background of the group of artists, linking the contingent story with a more universal notion.”
The history
“Bloodless” is a police novel set in a post-war context, which tells the story of a woman who survived an armed attack on her family farm. The atmosphere of the play proposes, on the part of the company, the aesthetic influence of film noir from the 50s and 60s, thus highlighting the darkness of the characters’ lives.
It all begins one peaceful afternoon on a family farm, when the apparent tranquility is abruptly interrupted by three armed men. Knowing this, the father of the family (a former torturer) hides his little daughter under the floorboards. When the gunmen enter the house they shoot the man and his son to death.
Fifty years later, the only survivor becomes the executioner of her executioners, and there is only one left to finish her “mission.” In the meeting an unexpected – although ambiguous and perhaps transitory – reconciliation emerges. At least that night, it was BLOODLESS.
Questions
The work raises questions about the true end of wars. What happens to people when they are not protected by state/government justice? How does a person marked by a violent and tragic past live or survive, which is ignored, made invisible and minimized by the rest of society? Now, sometimes, justice does arrive, although late, and fails to repair any situation, which can be conceived as a kind of impertinent mockery – and even re-victimization.
In Chile, 50 years after the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet (1973-1990), impunity persists to a large extent, which has undoubtedly generated, beyond its obvious social fracture, a keloid scar that from time to time reopens. and keep the surviving victims – and offspring – in some dark way – as if tied in that dark sinister halo of film noir – unfailingly tied to a tortuous, ineffable past, which like an unfinished puzzle is still present in search of that last piece of closure. .
How then to overcome the traumas and wounds of war? Do they really end when the winners say it’s over? Silenced, defeated people, on the margins of the new social future, forgotten, alone, with the past anchored behind their backs, become that white elephant that the neoliberal “new world” full of perfect but false smiles eludes to see.
In the play, the final encounter of these two characters with their respective solitudes, both coming from opposite sides: she, the daughter of a murdered torturer, and he, a former militant, is confusing… She knows that her father was a bad guy However, it was his father. He knows she understands him, but he understands her pain. Disconnected from the present, they meet to end her and his revenge mission, knowing that he was going to be executed. Both have become murderers.
Reflection
Through the montage, in a conversation with the theater company, Zagal points out that the work expresses the relevance of “not forgetting, but continuing life.”
Laura Pizarro adds that it is important to “try to improve the trauma, because if not, it continues to exist in the offspring. That’s why working with memory has to do with that, with clearing things up, dotting the i’s. Societies have become increasingly complex, today we have two wars. It is as if the human species does not learn from the past. (…) If these problems are faced, at least there is a moment of peace – without blood – to face and take responsibility. (…) How your own actions impact. “Everything we do as a human group affects the other, because individualism is also a lie, because everything affects and in some way influences the other.”
“After an armed conflict, that generation is left with almost irreversible trauma, a lot of work has to be done. The pain of someone who was tortured, the deaths, the fractures that our society experienced in the 70s and later in the military dictatorship, does not mean everything is over and now we live happily with the free market. We cannot live stuck in the past, but we do have to reflect, and the murderers must be judged as they deserve. (…) you have to face the pain and continue living as best you can. With the social outbreak, it became clear that everything changes so that nothing really changes (…) It is super complex, when society doesn’t care at all about what happened to you. So, the lack of justice leads to this tragedy,” adds Zagal.
As for international critics, the Frenchwoman praised the premiere of “Sin Sangre” in Paris, highlighting the artistic treatment and unprecedented technique of the company, in addition to the universal exploration of the wounds caused by a dictatorship.
According to Le Monde, the “fantastic invention” made by the Teatrocinema Company reaffirms its position as “the most important company in Chile.”
This work was co-produced by French entities and Teatro a Mil, being the first production sponsored by FITAM, which allowed them to tour Asia, Europe, Latin America and the United States.
ASSEMBLY-CREATION TEAM 2007
Author of the novel: Alessandro Baricco
Adaptation: Dauno Tótoro, Laura Pizarro, Zagal and Diego Fontecilla
Translation: Claudio Di Girolamo
Address: Zagal
Cast: Laura Pizarro, Zagal, Diego Fontecilla,
Ernesto Anacona y Etienne Bobenrieth
Art direction: Rodrigo Bazáes
Comprehensive design: Rodrigo Bazáes, Cristian Reyes and Cristian Mayorga
Costume design: Loreto Monsalve
Technical director: Luis Alcaide
Original music: Zagal
Filming director: Dauno Tótoro
Director of photography: Arnaldo Rodríguez
Camera and Offline editing: Marcelo Vega
Multimedia system design: Cristian Reyes and Mirko Petrovich
Multimedia technician: Lucio González
Soundtrack design: Marco Díaz
Light design: Rodrigo Bazáes and Luis Alcaide
Storyboard: Abel Elizondo
Still photography: Rodrigo Gómez Rovira
Costume creation: Juana Cid
Lighting technician: Luis Alcaide
Sound engineer: José Luis Fuentes and Matías del Pozo
Equipment: Christian Mayorga
General production: Jose Pedro Pizarro
ACTUAL TEAM
Address: Zagal
Cast: Laura Pizarro, Christian Aguilera, Daniel Gallo, Julián Marras and Zagal
Lighting design and operation: Luis Alcaide
Video operator: Lucio González
Sound engineer: Alonso Orrego “alonsonido”
Theater: Encounter Village
Address: Av. Alcalde Fernando Castillo Velasco 9750, 7860252 La Reina
Ticket value: $7,000 and $10,000
Telephone inquiries: +569 6474 2465