For Renata Schussheim, the key to the success of this version of Boquitas Pintadas is the emotions. In the Martín Coronado room, the largest in the San Martín theater complex, people laugh, sigh, cry and at the end they stop to applaud with cheers. No matter the day or the function, those who have the opportunity to see it agree that it is a theatrical event. “Today for me the most important thing is to provoke some kind of feeling, direct and emotional. That does not go through the head so much but that moves with the music, the text and the performance of the dancers-actors. Obviously, Boquitas provokes all of this, because people leave very grateful”, says Schussheim, who is in charge of the dressing room and directs with Oscar Araiz.
The first time this interpretation of Manuel Puig’s novel was presented was 25 years ago, and the reviews back then were just as moved as today’s audiences. According to choreographer Araiz, working with Schussheim has a lot to do with making all the details work: “It’s like playing with fire, drinking champagne, traveling in a balloon and falling down a roller coaster, all simultaneously,” he says. This year, Puig would turn 90 and there are many tributes that serve as a bridge to return to his work. In addition to this version performed by the Contemporary Ballet of San Martín, at the Book Fair there was a parade of his characters and the Seix Barral label is reissuing his novels, with prologues written by authors such as Claudia Piñeiro, Tamara Tenenbaum and Camila Sosa Villada.
“It is easy to identify with Puig’s words, which compassionately unmask our hypocrisies, solemnities, envy, kitsch. In Boquitas they are enhanced by the bodily gestures of the performers, sometimes simple and realistic, sometimes absurd, incoherent or poetic,” says Araiz, who reads in the result a sum of factors that come together: “There is the original and intelligent that Puig proposes, the sound musical by Edgardo Rudnitzky, a very careful and detailed staging and an exciting performance that evades labels, because it surprises, evokes, remembers, dreams and plays”.
Whoever has read Puig’s second novel will find the texts verbatim, a gossip choir that appears in the form of letters, confessions and radio plays, among other resources. In the work, the method to introduce them on stage is that of phonemics (the TikTok generation knows this technique as “lip sync”, the art of gesturing on a track). In those amplifications recorded in 1997, which are kept in perfect condition, the voices of Víctor Laplace, Divina Gloria, Mausi Martínez, Andrea Politti, Pedro Segni, Catalina Speroni, Alejandra Flechner, Alejandro Tantanian, Mario Filgueira and Betty Couceiro are heard.
“It’s practically the same version as 25 years ago. It’s more condensed, let’s say tighter in terms of people’s participation, but the soundtrack is the same, and I think the success is because Puig’s words are still very valid”, says Schussheim. For her, the opportunity to work with Araiz again is a pleasure, they already manage a code that makes things flow: “We have a lot of affinity and we have fun, we are friends. We have traveled through incredible places, he is one of the few people with whom I can share a vacation and it is not necessary to avoid silence when they appear, we can simply remain in a contemplative state watching a sunset. We have shared an entire life and that is priceless. And very rare.”
Both Araiz and Schussheim point out that on other occasions -this is the fourth time they have presented it- actors participated, which on this occasion was not necessary since with the current cast “ballet and acting go hand in hand”. There is a curious fact. The director of the Company, Andrea Chinetti, participated in the work 25 years ago, but as a dancer and assistant. “When making Boquitas came up again, we had several meetings and I suggested to Oscar that he do an internal casting so that he would realize that within the ballet there were many dancer-actors, in fact I think that the dancers must be actors in some way, since we play characters all the time,” says Chinetti. “We have very talented people, this company and the Escuela del San Martín that prepares them is a source of pride for Argentina”.
The Contemporary Ballet of San Martín was born in 1968 and was created by Araiz himself, who was then 28 years old and already dedicated a leading role in his life to dance and choreography. Since then, every year they present several programs in the halls of San Martín and also tour provinces and festivals around the world. “This 2022 the company turns 45 and we are going to replace ‘Bolero’, by Ana Maria Stekelman, and a production by Josefina Gorostiza that includes a dj and will be presented in the hall. In October there will be the exhibitions of the choreographic workshops of the dancers, which show their work every year, and we have planned a tour of the country”, says Chinetti.
When rehearsals for Boquitas pintadas began in 2020, the pandemic put them to the test: it was the first time they practiced virtually, with the complexity that includes reviewing choreographies between several people through a screen. Chinetti was confident that there would be a good reception, beyond the usual audience they usually receive: “When the work was presented for the first time, it worked extremely well, and 25 years later I think that Puig’s text is still valid, just as Renata is. and Oscar. That’s why it was expected to work as it is doing.”
For Schussheim, the creative process with Puig was similar to that of other theatrical shows: “When one reads a text, a script, is in front of music or talks -because with Oscar we work a lot talking-, the head imagines a world, which is being suggested to you by what you have in front of you”. In the case of Araiz, doing choreography can be an adventure that is renewed each time: “The text is music, time, silences, meaning. You have to listen to him carefully, let yourself be carried away by him, accompany him”. Schussheim and Araiz, two vertiginous trajectories that it would be unfair to summarize, are a luxury for Buenos Aires theater. Combining them with the popular pulse of Puig results in an exquisite formula.
Painted mouths is presented Friday, Saturday and Sunday at 8:00 p.m. at the San Martín Theater Complex.
Creation of the original soundtrack: Edgardo Rudnitzky. Realization of the original soundtrack: Edgardo Rudnitzky and Gustavo Dvoskin. Sound mastering: Fabio Silva. Lighting design: Roberto Traferri. Set design Alberto Negrín. Video design: Matias Otalora. Costume design: Renata Schussheim. Replacement of the scenery: Noelia Svoboda and Matias Otalora. Direction assistance and replacement: Yamil Ostrovsky. Choreography: Oscar Araiz. Idea, adaptation and direction: Renata Schussheim and Oscar Araiz
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