EL ZOO DE CRISTAL

 

Author: Tenesse Williams

Tittle: El zoo de cristal

Theatre company:  Producciones de Cristina Rota

Director: Agustín Alezzo

Cast:

            _Tom: Luis Tosar

            _Amanda: Cristina Rota

            _Laura: Maria Botto

            _Jim: Juan Carlos Vellido

 

Artstical and technical staff:

            _Set & clothes design: Ana Garay

            _Set & clothes design assistant: Teresa Rodrigo

            _Lights: Felipe Ramos

            _Original Soundtrack: Mariano Marin

            _Record studio: “Sound Garden”

            _Sound engineer: Pepe Manchado

            _ Vals Choreography: Monica Ruende

            _Graphic design: Luis Castro

            _Photography: Jean Pierre Ledos

_Comunication: CNC/Alicia Ovando

_Director assistant: Amanda Rodríguez

_Production boss: Carlos Montalvo

_Executive production: Producciones Teatrales Contemporáneas, S.L.

_Production: Producciones Cristina Rota, S.A. 

_Transport: Transpet

_Lights technical: Teatrek

 

Place and day of the representation: Sunday, 18^th December 2005, in Teatro Principal

 

Dramatis personae

 

_Tom: He is the son in a family whose father has left them. He also plays the role of the narrator. There are moments when he tells the story to the audience. He is tired of his mother, of his life in that family, so every night he leaves home and goes to the cinema. He is worried about his sister and wants to find her a husband because his mother tells him. He is a dreamer. He works in a shoe’s shop. Her mother is always disturbing, not leting him be, so at the end, he decides going away and left home as his father did.

_Amanda: She is the mother of the family. She is very disturbing and he always is complainning about her son and telling him that he should be worry about his sister. She tells him that he must find a husband to his sister, because she is getting older and she is disabled and she needs a husband. She doesn’t let live to her son.

_Laura: She is the Tom’s sister. She is a very melancholic person. She’s a disabled person, she can’t walk right, she has a problem in the leg, and she is full of complexes. She is in love with Jim, so, when she knows that he is coming her house, he goes very embarrased.

_Jim: He is mate of Tom. They work together. Tom bring him to his house because he wants that he and his sister fall in love each other. He apparently fall in love with Laura, and they kiss each other but at the end he says that she has a girlfriend and he can’t be with Laura.

 

Space

 The space in the play is always the same. It is a house in the sur of United States in the 20^th century, in the forties. Is an indoor space, the house of the family. Is the living room of the house. At the end of the stage there is a big windows.

At the right of the stage there is a stairs that go to the street and a wall. In this wall is where Tom is rested when he plays the role of narrator. There is no change in the set. Beyond the scenary is supposed that there are the cook and the bedrooms.

 

Lights

 Lights are very important in this play. A characteristic in this play is that the frame with the picture of the Tom’s father is always lighted, in every moment althoug there is a dark light, the frame is always lighted but when there is the dark when Tom plays the role of narrator. Also it’s important the lights in the windows to know what part of the day they are.

 

Clothes

 The clothes of the play are clothes from that age, from the half of the 20^th century. There is a change in the clothes of Tom when he plays the role of narrator. He appears with a jacket and a hat of sailor. Laura and her mother wears always the same clothes except when Jim comes to supper to their house.

 

Atrezzo

 There is a lot of atrezzo in this play, the scenary is a living room so, there are a lot of furnitures: sofas, chairs, tables, etc. There is also a gramo phone and a telephone. And a very important detail is the frame with the picture of the father of the family which make the presence of the father although he doesn’t appear, because he left them many years ago. But the most important element it’s a little table with animal figures made of glass, a small glass zoo. From here is where the name of the play comes.

 

Theatre atmosphere

 The representation was quite calm, but there were two moments when my attention was distracted. The first was when a women in the row behind me wanted to leave the auditorium and it was dark so she stumbled and fell in the floor. The second moment was when Tom was saying the last monologue, a very important moment in the play. He was saying his monologue when a horn of a car outside the theatre started to ring.

 

Personal opinion

 I think this is one of the most important and good plays that I have seen. The actors are spectaculars, the work of Luis Tosar is perfect, he gets to create the character of Tom perfectly and his voice and his diction is very clear, what is very important. Everybody knows that he is a splendid actor, he has proved it in his films. Cristina Rota and Juan Carlos Vellido also have worked very good, although, personally I don’t like very much these woman. Maria Botto, in my opinion, she doesn’t works bad, but she is the worst of them. I don’t like her voice and there are moments when the audience don’t understand well what she was telling. In short, I have enjoyed a lot this play because the interpretation is very good, and they make that the audience feels what the characters feel.

With respect to the script, I think that is a little bit dull, but all the plays that belong to the movement called realism are dull. The play is long and the audience become a little bit tired, because like all the realism’s plays apparently there is nothing to happen, it’s very lineal. The end of the play is like the rest of plays of the realism, the character left his house, as Nora did in “Casa de muñecas” or  in the play “Tio Vania”.

In general the play as I have said before, I think is one of the best I have seen, I like it very much, but I admit that it can result a little bored for the people who doesn’t like the realism.