The director of the Free Theatre, Juan Carlos Martel, believes that “we live in a world where we are taught to heal, but not to live or die”. This aspect is what is addressed in the piece Tot el que passarà from now on, a monologue by Joan Yago, directed by Glòria Balañà and starring Nil Cardoner, which premieres today at the Teatre Lliure de Gràcia (until April 16 ).
The monologue of a 16-year-old boy starts from a premise of the director: “I have to go to the hospital because my father is dying.” Balañà explains: “I was a seed and the Lliure welcomed me and Joan Yago signed up for the project. The idea was to get closer to illness and loss. What happens in life when this happens? Time dislocates and changes the meaning and order of things”.
The director wanted to go beyond a person suffering from an illness and explored the point of view of an adolescent son, for whom, in her opinion, his father’s illness limits his life, and the loss becomes a break: “The adolescence is already a mourning, a change, an internal chaos. If you have to lose a parent, your world breaks even more.
Balañà celebrates the understanding with the playwright, with whom he has worked closely: “Joan has written a movie script, with a lot of narration and very theatrical at the same time.”
Yago, a playwright from the company La Calòrica, declares that “the process of creating Tot el que passarà partir d’ara has been fascinating and very hard. With Glòria we start from the question of death and adolescence. Talking about adolescence can sometimes be unpleasant.
The two creators did a series of interviews with young people who had lost a parent and also with couples who had lost a partner. And they mention the work of the psychologist Silvia de Quadras, a specialist in mourning and adolescence, who has been very useful for the monologue.
But the result is, above all, a play. “We decided not to do documentary theater –explains Yago–, but to explain Èric’s story during one night. The father has had a long illness, with a few hospitalizations, but now the end has come. The work is hard, with very real moments and moments of magic. But it is neither an essay nor a treatise on mourning, it is the story of Èric”.
Yago also declares that he was not aware, “but there are some coincidences with a genre of farewell trips, such as Un obús al cor, by Wajdi Mouawad”.
The person responsible for bringing this monologue to the stage is the actor Nil Cardoner, who has just played Romeo in the play directed by David Selvas. “It has been one of the most stimulating processes, and it has been easy within the complication, very democratic and a lot of teamwork”, concludes the 24-year-old actor.
Catalan version, here
