Premieres, guided tours of stages and backstage areas, free récitas, tributes, evocations of April and a protest are among the hundreds of activities announced for today, World Theater Day, in Portugal, all over the country.
Bertolt Brecht, David Mamet, Federico García Lorca, Tankred Dorst are some of the playwrights on stage in different locations, while actors such as Rui Mendes, in Lisbon, and Ruy de Carvalho, in Viseu, are honored, and the premieres extend from North to South.
The Teatro Nacional S. João, in Porto, opens its doors for the rehearsal of “Fado Alexandrino”, based on António Lobo Antunes, and the Nacional D. Maria celebrates “O teatro que Abril abriu”, at the Capitólio, in Lisbon, starting the “Abril Abriu” cycle, which runs until July, with 18 shows, in various venues around the city.
In Vila Real, the company Filandorra – Teatro do Nordeste is marking World Day with “O cutelo do Adão” (Adam’s cleaver), a performance in protest at the still Minister of Culture, Pedro Adão e Silva, for the lack of support in the biennial competitions run by the Directorate-General for the Arts.
The company Momento – Artistas Independentes, from Vila Nova de Famalicão, is premiering “Eu sou Lorca” (I am Lorca), based on the Andalusian poet and playwright’s “Assim que passem cinco anos” (As soon as five years have passed), to think about what it means to be an artist during a dictatorial regime and about freedom in the arts.
The Teatro Experimental de Cascais premieres “Últimos remoros antes do esquecimento” by Jean-Luc Lagarce, directed by Elmano Sancho. In Alverca, Cegada gives its first performance of “Bartleby’s Refusal”, by Herman Melville, adapted by Ricardo Cabaça.
In Lisbon, there are premieres at Teatro Aberto (“A life in the theater”, by David Mamet), and at Teatro Armando Cortez, by Companhia da Esquina (“Terror and misery in the Third Reich”, by Brecht). The proceeds from this show will go to Apoiarte – Casa do Artista, which is organizing a lunch with around two hundred artists. At the S. Luiz Teatro Municipal there will be a free screening of “Fedra (não é de pedra)”, a play by Martim Pedroso which premiered the day before.
Also in Lisbon, the parish of Santo António, which covers Parque Mayer, is inaugurating the inscription of the names of 33 more theater personalities on the sidewalk of Praça da Alegria, which now has 112. Among the new honorees is actor Rui Mendes, with a career spanning more than 60 years.
In Porto, the Teatro Carlos Alberto hosts the staged readings “Crepúsculo”, by the “Theatre for Democracy” project, which brings together the “concerns of four young European playwrights”: Francesca Lancelotti (“Outdefining”), Gurshad Shaheman (“A maré rises”), Stuer Dhaenens & Vanden Broecke (“Rexit!”) and Denise Duncan (“93 Meters Long)”.
Seiva Trupe will pay homage to one of its founders, actor António Reis, who died in 2022, present the new ‘síte’ and the play “Noite de solidão no capim”, by Castro Guedes.
In Braga, at the Theatro Circo, CTB – Companhia de Teatro de Braga will debate “What is theater for?” and present “Amphitheatre”, by Heinrich Von Kleist, while in Viseu, the exhibition “Retratos contados de Ruy de Carvalho” (Ruy de Carvalho’s portraits) will be inaugurated at Casa da Ribeira.
In Coimbra, O Teatrão is continuing a program of guided tours through sites of resistance to the Estado Novo dictatorship in the city, “where the flowers of the Revolution began to be sown”.
In Fundão, Este – Estação Teatral celebrates the day with “2+2=5”, based on George Orwell’s “1984”.
The Teatro das Beiras, from Covilhã, presents “The Great Imprecation before the City Walls”, by the German Tankred Dorst, at the Casa da Cultura in Seia.
Teatro do Noroeste – Centro Dramático de Viana signs the Portuguese translation of the World Theatre Day message, written this year by Nobel laureate Jon Fosse, who recognizes in art the expression of peace, against all wars: “War and art are opposites, just as war and peace are opposites – it’s as simple as that. Art is peace.”
