MIAMI.- The Cuban-American playwright Nile Crosscreator of twenty plays and winner of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Anna in the Tropicssurprises again in Miami, as author and director, with the world premiere of Thirst in the street for waterwith only four performances, in the Black Box of the Miami Dade County Auditorium, until Sunday, March 17.
Produced by Alexa Kube and her label ARCA Images, and set in a sanatorium in the 1930s, Thirst in the street for water, Originally written in English and translated into Spanish by Kuve, it tells the story of a young couple of painters who, enthralled by art, pleasure and love at first sight, begin a cumbersome marital relationship in a complex society that is suffering a strong crisis. economic
Rejected by her bourgeois father-in-law, who wants to direct his son in another direction, according to her assessment, the artist falls into depression after seeing her little daughter die from the cold and feeling discouraged by a premature marital relationship that fails to overcome economic problems.
Treated by a psychiatrist, who discovers in art that the painter manifests a path to healing, she undertakes an exhausting healing process.
The set, minimalist and conceived by Frank Oliva, makes use of essential elements that fully fulfill their functions: three chairs that signify the three central personnel, a bathtub that is the place for important staging, and a type of screen in the shape of a circumference that It hangs from the ceiling and defines a circular space on the floor that seems to denote the confinement of a problem that has no way out.
The opportune snow that falls in the background of the stage helps to perceive the cold winter that ended the little girl’s life and covers the characters with anguish at times.
Here the lights, conceived by Enesto Pinto, highlight isolated interpretations of the characters, which delight the audience with important reflections.
The faint music, transitory at times and selected by Cruz, does not distract the viewer at any time.
Composed of an outstanding circumstantial rhyme, which once again reveals the poetic side of the author, Cruz relies in his text on retrospective sequences that help to understand the reasons for the painful situation.
Thirst in the street for water It takes place in three periods: the past that the two young characters live at the end of the 1920s in Mexico after meeting in New York, at the height of Diego Rivera’s muralism, and then at the beginning of the 1930s back to the big city.
Why Cruz chose Mexico and Rivera, and not Cuba, with the effervescence of Cuban modernist painting with Victor Manuel and others, is a question that, without chauvinist spirit, we must ask him.
In any case, the author, as a creator, enjoys absolute freedom to compose his work.
Claudia Toms, young Cuban actress, whom we remember in Miami for important performances in The bald soprano, A park in my house and the movie Plantedassumes the difficult role of the overwhelmed mother who loses her daughter and through which she goes through with successful statements that, as she stated at the end of the performance, it is difficult for her to get into that skin that she does not know.
Daniel Romero, Cuban, whose performances we take into account in Tebas Land, Hierro y A park in my house, as the film Plantedtakes on the role of Joaqun, the young painter husband who does what he is capable of doing to save the marriage, with accurate performances.
The psychiatrist, played by the also Cuban, Carlos Acosta Milin, whose performances we have enjoyed in Ren’s tale, Two sisters and a piano, Hierro and the unforgettable Lorca in a green dress; He manages to walk, with character, the fine line of the doctor who wants to help, cure, and prevent, at the same time, the patient’s pain from affecting him.
Special mention deserves the special performance of the Venezuelan actor Orlando Urdaneta, who also assists Cruz as director and whose works would be too many to mention, who assumes the role of the Mexican bourgeois father in the style of the old theatrical school, with absolute personality and subtle accent included.
Cruz and his production team once again create a theatrical piece that demonstrates the richness of collective creation, despite the inconveniences that good theater faces on a daily basis.
En el Black Box, Miami Dade County Auditorium, 2901 W. Flagler St., Miami.
Performances: Thursday, March 14, Friday, March 15, and Saturday, March 16, 8 pm, and Sunday, March 17, 3 pm.
Tickets available at www.arcaimages.org via the Internet.
