‘With how well we were. Ferretería García’, a work awarded with two Max Awards, will be the second work of the Festival on February 11.
FFebruary is once again theater month in L’Almunia with the III edition of the “Luis de los Ríos Gracia” Festival. The City Council resumes its cultural program at the Salón Blanco Cinema-Theater with a sample of four works that, according to José Manuel Latorre, Councilor for Culture and Citizen Participation, “offers themes and genres for all tastes” with productions from the Aragonese and state scene .
The programming starts this Saturday, February 4, with the comic monologue “Fabiolo Connection” by Rafa Maza from Aragon; on February 11 it will be the turn of the melodramatic musical “With how well we were. Ferretería Esteban” by the Zaragoza company Nueve de Nueve Teatro; On February 18, Corral de García, also from Aragon, will interpret the drama based on the popular novel by Julio Llamazares “La lluvia amarilla”. The last performance, on March 4, will be given by the Catalan company Cascai Teatre & Marcel Tomàs with a proposal full of humor to parody the figure of the English playwright “Un tal Shakespeare”.
All works will be performed at 8:00 p.m. An “attractive poster” that, in addition, has the contribution of local talent, since the design is the work of the illustrator artist from Almunia Sandra Abad. The program has been carried out jointly by the Councilor for Culture and the area’s municipal technician, Anabel Langarita, municipal sources explain.
To facilitate attendance, the City Council has set a popular price for tickets and discount vouchers that can already be purchased on the web www.aragontickets.com. In addition, all interested persons can follow the programming of the contest on the social networks Twitter and Instagram at @artmunia #FestivalTeatroLaAlmunia2023.
A program for all tastes
The Aragonese actor and comedian Rafa Maza will be in charge of kicking off the festival this Saturday with his humorous monologue “Fabiolo Connection” which has a musical space designed by David Ángulo, composer of the Oregon TV program. This character, who already visited L’Almunia at the closing of the first edition of the festival, returns to present a new adventure. On this occasion, this “posh” and irreverent character is hired by a powerful sheikh from an Arab emirate to give tennis lessons to his daughter. Thus, Fabiolo undertakes an interactive conversation with the public in which he will present his particular reflection on the meaning of life in modern society, marked by contempt for losers and where “posture” and social conventions prevail.
On Saturday, February 11, the comedy will continue to be the protagonist with the Zaragoza company Nueve de Nueve Teatro and its title “With how well we were. Ferretería Esteban”, a melodramatic and humorous musical that narrates the story of Esteban and Maribel (played by Jorge Usón and Carmen Barrantes and live music by Néstor Ballesteros), a couple of Aragonese ironmongers who one day attend a construction site theater that inspires them to change their monotonous lifestyle and do everything they have been dreaming of for years. It is a work awarded with two Max Awards for best production work and best musical composition.
On Saturday, February 18, a well-known contemporary classic on depopulation will take to the stage in the White Room: a work based on the novel “La lluvia amarilla” by Julio Llamazares performed by the company of Santolaria de Galligo Corral de García. In it, the story of Andrés is told, an old man who in the 70s becomes the last inhabitant of Ainielle, an abandoned town in the Aragonese Pyrenees, where he remembers how little by little he has been left alone. An outstanding adaptation work acclaimed by critics that has toured theaters throughout the peninsula with the direction of Jesús Arbués and the interpretations of Ricardo Joven and Alicia Montesquiu.
To end the third edition of the “Luis de los Ríos Gracia” Festival, “Un tal Shakespeare” will be the protagonist on Saturday, March 4. The Catalan company Cascai Teatre & Marcel Tomàs dares to give a comic version of the classic English playwright in a fun parody in which kings, heroes, villains, traitors and lovers intertwine under the baton of actor and director Marcel Tomàs.
Regarding the name Luis de los Ríos Gracia as a title for the festival, “it is a proposal approved by the City Council in 2019 to remember the work of ‘Don Luis’, teacher, playwright, illustrator, researcher and restless defender of culture in all its facets and recognize the legacy of his work. In addition to the plays that he staged, adapted and wrote over more than 30 years, thanks to him many people discovered theatrical activity as a hobby that continues to be practiced by various amateur formations” Latorre explains.
Humour, parody and rural exodus, protagonists of the 3rd L’Almunia Theater Festival