Fernando Godoy revives “Los opas (another bourgeois drama)” with the cast of the original production.
Ana, Ernesto and Mario are three siblings who are going through a complicated situation: they are tired of emotionally and financially supporting their authoritarian, octogenarian mother, who severely manipulates them. When the family situation becomes unsustainable, they decide to kill her, an option they consider the only way to overcome the yoke. But at that moment filial love appears, leading to confusion of feelings. Each one, from a dazed and particular look, oscillates between the two extremes, leading the viewer to an unexpected end.
This is the plot of “Los opas (another bourgeois drama)”, the black comedy by Daniel Dalmaroni which will return to the local stages today at the Virla Cultural Center (May 25, 265) from 9 p.m. The play premiered in the province in 2018 and is now being revived with the same cast and direction: they perform Liliana Juarez, Josefina Ocaranza, Diego Borges and Alvaro Alderete under the leadership of Fernando Godoy Fresneda.
Addressing the issue of killing the parent appears, at first glance, as politically incorrect, but the director questions that conception. “I don’t know what political correctness is; I only know that it is at the convenience of the politicians in power what is right or wrong. As for theater, I consider that there is art as long as one wants to express something from the artist’s point of view. Right or wrong is subjective; If we approach it from the humor that we bring to the scene, it departs from the natural canons of conventionality or what we understand as satirical humor that mocks reality,” he says.
Godoy enjoys directing again: “he has a different taste than what I am passionate about, which is acting; I have gone through difficult times that make recovering this role very pleasant, like everything related to the performing arts that I have been developing uninterruptedly for more than 30 years, and it will always be a pleasure to face new projects, whether up or down. From Stage”.
About this particular setting, he admits that it is challenging. “We address taboo topics in society such as death, illness, violence and discrimination, helping people face pain or suffering to find humor in difficult situations. It is a work that satirizes situations and you have to be careful not to fall into offense towards people who do not share the aesthetics,” he describes.
“Sigmund Freud talks about killing the father as something we must do psychologically to mature. In the case of the characters, they need to free themselves from what keeps them trapped. They are full of fears and frustrations, they blame her mother for all her ills and consider that by killing her they will escape from them. It is just a hindrance that they must remove from their miserable life, which in itself is the bourgeois drama that the author speaks of,” he says.
As in any theatrical approach, the situation raised by Dalmaroni in his text goes beyond the family environment in which he operates and allows us to think about society as a whole. “We live in a time where references are ephemeral: many dissolve on their own or commit suicide (metaphorically speaking). There is great intolerance and blaming others without taking responsibility for one’s own, but no act of violence will lead us to any salvation and each one is the architect of his or her own destiny,” Godoy concludes.
