The song Mi Querida España, by Cecilia, brought to an end this Thursday at the Abadía theater the premiere of Altsasu in Madrid and a night of intense emotions. Two hundred people, separated from the theater entrance by a police cordon, have chanted slogans such as “Counselor, resignation”, “Against ETA, machine gun” and, now without rhymes and repeatedly, “Pedro Sánchez, son of a bitch” during one hour. They had been convened by Vox and were headed by Rocío Monasterio and Javier Ortega Smith, who have assured that the Basque company’s production of The Dramatic Errant “whitewashes terrorism.”
And they have asked for the resignation of the head of Culture of the Community of Madrid, the popular Mariano de Paco, for financing, they have said, with 1.8 million a theater that “allows a work like this.” A production for which the audience at the Abbey – a private, non-profit foundation – ended up giving it a standing ovation while some of the actresses cried with emotion.
The work addresses the beating of two civil guards who were with their girlfriends in a bar in the Navarrese town of Alsasua in 2016. And the subsequent trials of the accused, who were even asked for 50 years for terrorism. And he does it without expressing an opinion, from the story, the look and the pain of all those involved, showing everything from the threats to the baby of one of the guards to the years of waiting in prison for the accused. Not in vain was it born in a project titled Cicatrices that sought to heal wounds.
The Secretary of State for Culture, Jordi Martí from Barcelona, ??attended the premiere, and after noting how strange it was that a police officer had to check the tickets of the attendees to let them pass, he pointed out that the Vox call “is a nonsense, one more of this battle with which Vox, in some cases with the complicity of the PP, is making something that seemed banished in our country, which is censorship, return.”
And he assured that he came to support all artistic expressions “that suffer this type of unjustifiable attacks in a democratic State.” Neither the City Council nor the Community of Madrid, which are part of the Abbey’s board of trustees, have been, and Martí has ??highlighted that “there are people who think that democracy is simply voting every four years, but it has a central element, which is the space for public conversation, where all opinions fit and democratic dialogue is built. Art has a fundamental role there, which is to ask the most uncomfortable questions. And the defense of artistic freedom should be the central element of any cultural leader.”
The artistic director of the Abbey, the RAE academic and playwright Juan Mayorga, thanked the audience on stage “more than ever, for being here.” And he has said that “a theater is a place for peace and freedom because those who come to it do so freely, and freely choose to look and listen and judge what they have seen and heard, and because different people who come together gather there. “They agree to unite their eyes and ears on a stage where actresses and actors represent possibilities of what we call humanity.”
