Capmany was a very transgressive woman, with much lucidity and very left-wing, that the same bourgeoisie that criticizes has wanted to erase”. This is how the director of the National Theater of Catalonia, Carme Portaceli, defines the Barcelona writer Maria Aurèlia Capmany, a political, cultural and feminist activist.
Now the TNC stages its satirical cartoons Vent de garbí and a little fear, which portray the Catalan bourgeoisie during the summer, keeping aloof from the historical events taking place: the Tragic Week of 1909, the Civil War in 1936 and May 1968. From Cadaqués, Sitges and Caldetes, the bourgeoisie tries not to be affected by what is shaking the world.
Judith Pujol, who is the director of Vent de garbí i una mica de por and who signs the adaptation with Albert Boronat, explains: “I have spoken with people who knew her to transfer her vital and ironic spirit to this comedy. Capmany writes three scenes in a farce, which he mixes with the news that arrives, and there are also cabaret elements. Under the aspect of farce, there is a lot of work and a lot of truth”.
On the stage of the Petita room, David Anguera, Laura Aubert, Alba Florejachs, Àurea Márquez, Miquel Malirach, Albert Mora, Miriam Moukhles and Joan Solé “interpret, sing and play instruments”, says Pujol. “We have practically not touched Capmany’s texts. We have a lot of documentation of him. She was a great connoisseur of Catalan culture, but I couldn’t make a play about her, ”declares the director.
At the time, starting in 1968, Capmany added a fourth summer, but “she was aware that it was easy to criticize the Catalan bourgeoisie from previous episodes, but the present was more difficult, and the same thing happens to us,” she says. Boronat. “This fourth summer that would be our turn is very difficult to do because we live in tremendous uncertainty. That is why we have tried to carry out an exercise starting from the Capmany of the left, trying to dialogue from the present”.
“The characters in the play see the world based on how they feel at that moment, based on emotion,” continues Boronat. That is what Capmany believed distorted the political discourse and decentered the revolution, and today all politics is done from emotion. Capmany is very intellectual, but he is not a cap, as he happens now. He had a very good festive air and he thought in a casual way, because he was also a councilor for the City Council and he knew everything very well ”, he concludes.
Catalan version, here
