Through the YouTube platform, the Ciudad Alta District Council presented last week a film production directed by Domingo Doreste, supported by an original idea of the members of the Sociocultural Association El Ómnibus: Teatro del Pueblo and with a script by Fernando Becerra .
In short film format and with a duration of about 40 minutes, ‘Galdós, dreams of the future’ has as its main protagonists the writer from Gran Canaria and the streets of his city that bear the names of some of his best-known works or of the main characters of his novels.
Filmed for the most part in the neighborhoods of the Ciudad Alta district (mainly in San Antonio, Schamann, Escaleritas, Altavista, 7 Palmas and Barrio Atlántico), the cast is made up of residents of these neighborhoods, interpreters who have done an extraordinary job and a huge effort, since the short was shot throughout this 2020, with all the hygienic-sanitary measures in force and they have also done it, altruistically.
Among the main protagonists of this production are Tato Antúnez in the role of old Galdós; María del Carmen Muñoz as Galdós’ assistant; Francisca Santana (Paqui); Raquel Hernández (Raquel and chestnut seller); Domingo Sánchez (shopkeeper and bookseller); Paula Trinidad (girl); Juan Ramón González (old curmudgeon); Antonio Betancor (Emiliano) or Alejandro Betancor (Alejandro and chestnut buyer). All the members of the Association El Ómnibus: Teatro del Pueblo have also participated in the filming.
‘Galdós, dreams of the future’ has also had the collaboration of the National Reference Center in makeup and hairdressing tasks; the Canarian Friends of the Opera (ACO) that has provided the costumes, as well as the Las Palmas de Gran Canaria City Council, which has provided spaces for filming such as the Mata Castle; the Altavista Market, the Church of Nuestra Señora de los Dolores de Schamann and the Benito Pérez Galdós House Museum.
The short film tells a fictional story starring Pérez Galdós, of whom this year we celebrate the centenary of his death. In the story, the Gran Canaria writer travels in dreams to the city where he was born, and walks through the streets of the upper part of the city, those that pay homage to the characters in his novels, finding a landscape dominated by people who walk through the city keeping distance and wearing masks. A story that travels through time and that dwells on everyday scenes starring local characters, but which could well be part of the stories that Don Benito novels.
United associations
The project is conceived by the Association El Ómnibus: Teatro del Pueblo, which was born from the merger of two associations that wish to actively participate in activities for the development of platforms for the dissemination of identity within the neighborhoods and within the city itself.
The main activity of this association has been, up to now, the representation of non-professional theater plays, developing in a transversal way with other artistic disciplines such as music.
The first association from which El Ómnibus was born was formed after the call to perform theater with young people from institutes and regulated training centers; Hence Theatrum Mundi was born, a group with which a free adaptation of ‘A Christmas Carol’ was made at Christmas 2018, entitled ‘Scrooge’.
The second was formed under the name of La Barraca, by the union of various residents of the Ciudad Alta district to stage the history of the historic Schamann neighborhood in the Don Benito park with the name ‘Histories of a neighborhood: Schamann’ , within the framework of the 2019 Fiestas de los Dolores.
These two groups come together in December 2019 to reenact ‘Scrooge’ and, after the success achieved, they take another step by officially joining as a sociocultural association in February of this year under the name of El Ómnibus: Teatro del Pueblo. , taking as a reference the newspaper to whose pages the young Benito Pérez Galdós dedicated youthful illusion and dedication.
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