CHILE Street Theater Takes Risks
Hautzinger, Sara
To don an eye-catching dictator's costume, complete with massive papier mache mask, on downtown Santiago's most trafficked pedestrian mall is no small act of bravery. But then to spread a...
...Still today, every Teuco performance begins with a recitation of the troupe's motto: "We believe everyone has the right to the street...
...True to her namesake Aquino, Corazon intercedes...
...Street theater is illegal in Chile, as is any activity undertaken on the streets without a permit...
...Rodolfo Pedraza, one Sarah Hautzinger is afree-lance journalist working in Santiago, Chile...
...The third performer paints a picture eerily close to the present reality: a state of resigned passivity where the animals exist hoping that the pig will die...
...What we're trying to do with theater is say 'Look, it's 1987 and still there is torture, still people are disappearing, still they are killing people in the streets--twelve in the last two weeks!' * We feel we cannot afford the luxury of staying quiet...
...Any resemblance to real persons or real situations is completely...
...Instead, they attempt to single out the plant, directing lines at him to force the crowd to recognize him: * Fifteen as of this writing...
...it has no impact...
...They see the greater permissibility in theaters as a trade-off for lower potential political impact...
...Even without overhead costs of salon theater, the economic existence of these performers is far from easy...
...A second describes a violent, but ultimately successful, revolution...
...The mass exodus of vendors and performers into downtown cathedrals and other refuges whenever Carabineros-Chile's military police-appear on the scene confirms this reality...
...At the end of the performance, the players explain that although they discussed it at great length, they could not agree on a conclusion and solicit the opinion of the audience...
...Because there remained no one...
...In a country with scarce funding for the arts, and even less for artists of the opposition, the street was seen as an available space that would allow them to avoid the overhead expenses of salon theater...
...Teuco has been cautious, or lucky-or both...
...Furthermore, in the street it is possible for performers to engage the audience in a manner not possible in a theater, where the lines between actors and viewers are clearer...
...One actor presents an ending where the animals unify and launch an effective strike which leads to a forced election...
...At a June presentation of the play at the predominantly leftist Second Annual Victor Jara Festival, there were audible hisses directed at the facile democratic solution, although the overall reception of the play was excellent...
...Ominous silence...
...He finishes, "And no one said anything...
...INTENTIONAL...
...People just might think you are imitating someone...
...This is only theater...
...While Teuco members may see silence as a luxury they can't afford, their chosen alternative can hardly be described as lavish...
...Efforts to diversify by performing in the poblaciones, Santiago's outlying poorer neighborhoods, and at political functions have helped somewhat...
...Bad weather, heavy police surveillance and frequent political demonstrations downtown eliminate many potential workdays...
...After the coins from passing the hat are collected to finance costumes, transportation, rent and utilities, the scant funds remaining allow only a modest living standard...
...The public inevitably votes against the king, but he jumps up and down anyway shouting, "I won, I won...
...In steps another actor...
...What seems a simple and light account is inevitably injected with a twist...
...Make no mistake, however: the play is about Chile and Chileans never fail to recognize their country in details that smack of home...
...In Krutania, the twist is that after the king is ousted from the far away planet, he and his wife turn their eyes skyward, looking for a new home, a new land to ruthlessly rule...
...Well, there you have the three endings we thought of," she says...
...Although Krutania suggests the possibility of a democratic transition, the actors themselves are not optimistic about that prospect and place more hope in revolutionary means...
...The initial step was taken for economic reasons...
...Teuco is presently adding a new work to its repertoire which treats the topic of exile through an Animal Farm-like scheme where a powerhungry pig takes over the farm and the freedom-loving chickens must steal away at night...
...We are left to assume that they found that place, on a planet named Earth in a country called Chile...
...Roberto Pablo, one of the first to revive street theater after the 1973 coup, remembers that amidst severe economic troubles, they began questioning why they should not have the right to public spaces...
...In a sense, this provides security for the actors in that they are less likely to be apprehended in front of sympathetic onlookers...
...The election, they know, refers not to the Philippines, but to Chile's so-called plebiscite of 1980, and aims to encourage people to think about the upcoming 1989 plebiscite...
...Crucial questions...
...Street vendor, Santiago of the longest-standing members, explains: "We do political street theater in order to wake people up...Some people call this pretentious, but I don't think so...
...In the act of posing them, Teuco members break the blanket of silence on the streets of Santiago, night after night...
...But after seven years of performing critical theater in Chile, Teuco's members are well aware of the risks they take, and very clear as to why...
...And you...
...At the next such engagement, Pablo prefaced the work by reminding the crowd that street theater in Chile was by no means a given, and that the group presents the strongest line viable in the street...
...I0 REPORT ON THE AMERICAS REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 10"Look, this is the real thing, they are among us...
...At the end of the play, actors take off their masks and address the audience with sudden sobriety...
...So harsh has been the repression, the number of assassinations, the torture and exile: the average Chilean has become so accustomed to seeing death every day that it doesn't hurt anymore...
...Teuco members express their views more freely than most Chileans, but a certain amount of self-censorship is inevitable...
...But, the fact that players from far less political street theater troupes have been arrested in the last year is a constant reminder of the tenuous nature of their work...
...Going one step beyond the double ending of Krutania, Cocolina, Poor Cocolina has a tripleending...
...A billion votes for me...
...In Krutania, an election is held among the audience between the king, Fernando, and the democratic candidate "Dama Corazon...
...Seeing other theatrical works and films-an essential occupational resource for actors-is also prohibitively expensive...
...A Political Challenge Traditionally, the challenge of political art of any medium is to relay a powerful message that neither leaves the audience feeling numb and hopeless, nor oversimplifies the issues to render commentary meaningless...
...Each of us knows which endings we'd like to see happen...
...When such a presence is detected-the actors seem to have developed a second sense about such informers-they do not stop the play unless forced to do so...
...One man, after seeing such a performance, remarked, "If everyone in Chile were like them, we wouldn't have been in this mess for 14 years...
...But after sides are split and cheeks sore from laughter, after pesos are dropped obligingly into circulating hats, the audience must leave the performance thinking...
...How did Teuco come to adopt the street as their stage, especially when salon theater is politically more permissive...
...But after all, we're just a bunch of actors...
...The audience frequently contains "toads" or plain clothes political police, which at least proves that the public is truly representative...
...In Chile's polarized class structure, only the more comfortable elite are privy to established theatrical productions...
...The Philippine allusion is a good example of a device used by Teuco to lightly veil the true orientation of their work...
...Should the satire, set in a brutal dictatorship of 14 years on the imaginary planet of Krutania, leave any doubts as to whether it refers to Chile under General Augusto Pinochet, Teuco sets out to dispel them...
...To present a dramatic work which addresses such issues as torture, electoral fraud and illegitimate rule, advocating the prompt removal of Krutania's despotic king through democratic means, further transgresses what is permissible on these streets...
...Teuco avoids falling prey to the former criticism with an imaginative use of allegory, elaborate costumes and masks, song, dance and above all, humor...
...But then to spread a lifesize human dummy on the ground and pantomime acts of violent torture, all the while casually conversing with someone dressed in the flashy garb of a dictator's wife, is to gamble with personal safety...
...They just might be right, for such is the memorable scene from the play Krutania, performed on Santiago streets by the Contemporary Urban Theater Company (Teuco...
...Engaging the Audience With time, the actors have become convinced that the street offers a much more dynamic and effective arena for political work...
...And no one did anything...
...In addition, the performers are saddled with constant anxiety...
Vol. 21 • July 1987 • No. 4
