Big Bang Professional Week, Temporada Alta Fights Against ‘Mierda Bonita’

Mierda bonita, or beautiful shit in English, is the term used in La luz de un lago/The light of a lake, the new play by El Conde de Torrefiel whose Spanish premier was in Temporada Alta Festival last month. This company uses it to define those plays that are pretty but with no content at all. The kind of shows that are entertaining and brilliant, and an excuse to go out with friends and to have dinner.

The way I see, beautiful shit is not the target of this festival. At least, it is not during the Big Bang Professional Week that has been held from 21^st to 24^th November in Girona. Eventually, the program for these days is a challenge for theatergoers and professionals that come from all over the world, although they mainly are Spaniards and most of them from Catalonia.

Therefore, this week is like a congress, but without lectures and with professional meetings and many shows to see. A place where professionals could discuss how to implement the new European Union goal of blurring borders of the European Countries promoting artistic collaboration between theaters or institutions regionally. In addition, they could see this European policy in action because some shows programmed consider this goal and receive European funds to implement it.

Consequently, the number of theater professionals, journalists, and theatergoers in Girona increases a lot during Big Bang Professional Week. Eventually, being sold out was common for many shows. This year the most popular were Bérénice, the French classic by Racine directed by the Italian Romeo Castellucci and starring the French actress Isabelle Huppert and co-produce by French, Italian and Spanish theaters, organizations and festivals.

It was not the only one. There were more productions that grabbed the attention of audiences as much as Bérénice. For example, the play mentioned in the first paragraph, La luz de un lago (The light of a lake) or Totentanz. Morgen ist die Frage by La Veronal. Two Spanish companies that regularly tour Europe’s most important and avant-garde festivals and theaters.

However, none of the plays has got and unanimous opinion. For instance, debates after seeing productions were common. In this context, Castellucci’s Bérénice is a clear winner. Perhaps audiences who expected a theatrical version of the movies starring Isabel Huppert were disappointed. By contrast, the play is plenty of stunning images and is an exquisite and delicate theatrical production to tell the story of a woman in love of a man who rejects her because he wants to be the Rome Emperor.

If there were an official ranking, the second one would be able to be La Veronal’s Totentanz. Morgen ist die Frage. Although it is essentially the same choreography premiered in Madrid in Festival de Otoño the piece has changed in Girona due to the performance site. In Temporada Alta, it was in the desacralized church, which is part of the Centre Cultural la Mercè, instead of the white-walled rooms of Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía. Moreover, spectators in Girona were seated meanwhile they were standing up and had to move from one room to another in Madrid. Consequently, the public experience of the show is completely different.

Aside from its commitment to fighting pretty shit, La luz del lago/The Light of a Lake has little or nothing in common with the previous two. This play is the most shocking of them, and the most disturbing because of the contrast between what a voice-over tells and what happens on the stage. The result is a gap that is disconcerting to most viewers. Especially because of the difficulty of finding logical connections. Consequently, what seems simple becomes a profoundly complex experience because it makes the audience aware of their perceptual processes.

It is not the only play based on the processes of perception. Atresbandes, Bertrand Lesca and Nasi Voutsas talk of them again in the funny It don’t worry me. A comedy piece in which two performers, dressed in their underpants, explain what they are doing while they are doing it.

Despite its apparent simplicity, Azkona Toloza‘s Cuerpos celestes/Celestial bodies cannot be surpassed in terms of complexity. Among other things, because its subject is future space mining and how it will condition the existence of human beings. And because of the way it is staged, which is overly discursive, with a very intricate text. In its defense, it could be said that its time slot, after lunch, was not conducive to being fully appreciated.

Due to the lack of time, it was not possible to enjoy all the performances on the agenda for this long weekend. Such as Perdón/Sorry, a punk choreography by Losinformalls, or El castor que plorava, cabosanroque‘s latest sound installation freely based on a classic, El gran Teatro del mundo/The Great Theater of the World by Calderón de la Barca. In addition, there were some concerts and some films, such Reas/Female Prisoners a musical documentary by Lola Arias about transgender people. There was too much to see in just three days.

Anyway, the Big Bang Professional Week is not a complacent program. One of its aims is to activate the spectator as an individual, rather than numbing him. Either by liking what’s proposed or by rejecting it. In both cases, the audience must reflect on the content and form of what they have seen. Of course, there is nothing to stop you from going out to dinner before or after the show. What you cannot avoid is discussing the play you have seen and coming to your own conclusions, probably after several good conversations. And that even if you conclude that the play sucks, you will never think it sucks pretty.