"Mi dolor de exilio es tan grande que cubre todo mi cuerpo.

Muevo un dedo del pie y sufro".

Lejos de casa


Latin American Theatre Review: "Puerta Abierta al Mar en el Ateneo de Caracas" por Dra. Susana D. Castillo, Kansas University, 2007













 












Como parte de la trilogía escogida por el productor Benjamín Cohen para configurar el espectáculo “Tres dramaturgas del silencio al estallido,” se estrenó exitosamente PUERTA ABIERTA AL MAR de la argentina-venezolana Viviana Marcela Iriart. Este proyecto, donde se presentaban los tres montajes simultáneamente, empezó el 13 de abril y se mantuvo en cartelera por dos meses consecutivos en la sala de conciertos del Ateneo de Caracas. Las otras obras escogidas fueron Las  Tiendas del Sheik   de Carmen García Vilar y Casa en Orden  de Ana Teresa Sosa.

 
PUERTA ABIERTA…, cuyo texto inédito ha llegado hasta nosotros, explora el desarraigo de sus dos personajes en diferentes planos. En un primer nivel, la obra versa sobre el re-encuentro ansioso de dos mujeres separadas durante diez años. El tipo de relación de los personajes no se aclara pero es obvio que ha existido un pasado íntimamente compartido –casi simbiótico- desde la infancia y la adolescencia. Dunia y Sandra son ahora mujeres en sus cuarenta y de aspecto profesional. Acertadamente el encuentro inicial esta coreografiado en una danza lenta en la que las dos mujeres tratan de hallarse –como en una neblina – al mismo tiempo que reprimen la exteriorización de sus conflictivas emociones. Con reserva, y tratando de reconocer la huella dejada en ellas por el tiempo, las dos mujeres empezaran un dialogo, tirante a veces, que ira desplegando las reacciones contenidas. Axial ellas pasaran - con cautela y mesura - de la evocación a la risa, del canto a la nostalgia, de la distancia….al tango! El espectador se entera de esta manera que la brecha abierta en esta pareja radica en el motivo mismo del éxodo y en el rol que cada una ha asumido como razón vital: Sandra ha cortado sus raíces de un tajo al dejar el país y llevar con ella la denuncia vehemente de los abusos del poder; Dunia se ha quedado en un destierro interno, acosada por el clima de amenaza e incertidumbre cotidiano, usando mecanismos de defensa para sobrevivir los miedos. La nota álgida surge cuando ambas partes confrontan sus versiones y expresan, con dolor, sus dudas sobre la inutilidad del sacrificio vivido. Ambas, por otra parte, se sienten acusadas y enjuiciadas por su contraparte y esa sospecha detiene el flujo del afecto, del reencuentro y de la vida que ahora las reúne. El denominador común, de estas posturas antagónicas, sale a flote cuando Sandra y Dunia cobran consciencia de que la juventud nueva “no tiene memoria” y se ha olvidado ya de ese capitulo de la historia que a ellas –y a miles de compatriotas- los marco radicalmente. Ante esta realidad, la alienación aflora simultáneamente en las dos compañeras. Y es allí donde la obra alcanza otros niveles de significación mas amplios ya que traspasa la situación especifica de caracter político para llegar a un nivel existencial donde la soledad y los recuerdos habitan sin dar tregua.






De manera magistral la autora ha intercalado, a lo largo de la obra, la voz inconfundible de Susana Rinaldi al punto que la letra de las canciones parece entretejerse con los parlamentos de la obra, y, aun mas, parece crear un tercer personaje omnisciente. El recurso de la música actúa igualmente como soporte certero, como raigambre profunda de estos seres fragmentados. El final esperanzador, que se da a través de la voz de Rinaldi cantando apropiadamente “A pesar de todo” axial como en la aceptación conciliatoria de Sandra y Dunia, atenúa tiernamente la tensión emotiva mantenida en alto a lo largo de la pieza.

Es oportuno añadir que Viviana Marcela Iriart –novelista y periodista – estuvo refugiada en el consulado de Venezuela a los 21 años, etapa en la que empezó su exilio que la llevaría a varias latitudes hasta ubicarse en Venezuela. A juzgar por el interés manifestado con el estreno de PUERTA ABIERTA…es dable augurar a la escritora Iriart muchos éxitos en sus futuras obras.


Dra. Susana D. Castillo
San Diego State University
Latin American Theatre Review
The University of Kansas
Fall 2007

Estados Unidos


















A DOOR OPEN TO THE SEA, play by Viviana Marcela Iriart: excerpt

 









The stage is barely lit. “Porque vas a venir” (Because you’re coming), a song by Carmen Guzmán and Mandy, sung by Susana Rinaldi, is played until the characters speak. 

Dunia enters from the right side. She is excited and nervous. She sits down, stands up, walks from side to side. She is thrilled. She can barely hold her laughter. 

Sandra appears on the left side. She is nervous and excited, but she moves slowly, in a controlled way. She stops at the large window, which is softly lit with a warm glow. She looks inside but sees no one: Dunia has left the stage at that point. She moves towards the proscenium. Dunia enters and does not see her. She goes to the proscenium. 

Until indicated, Sandra and Dunia behave as if they were in a dream. They never touch or look at each other. When they speak, it seems like they are talking to themselves. 


SUSANA RINALDI

“Because you’re coming my old house

unveils new flowers throughout the railing.

Because you're arriving, after so long,

I cannot tell if I'm crying or laughing.

 

I know you're coming, though you didn't say it,

but you'll arrive one morning.

There's a song in my voice, I'm not so sad,

and a ray of sunlight is coming through my window.

 

Because you're arriving, after a long journey,

there's a different hue, a different landscape.

Everything shines a different light and has changed its way,

because you're arriving after all.

 

Because you’re coming, from so far away,

I've looked at myself in the mirror once again.

And how will they see me, I asked myself,

the eyes of this day I was waiting for.


Because you're arriving I wait for you,

because you love me and I love you.

Because you're arriving I wait for you,

because you want it

and I want it too.”




SANDRA (As if she were alone, without noticing Dunia)
And then I thought, will she have changed much? Have I changed so much?

DUNIA (With the same attitude as Sandra)
I was waiting impatiently. I looked at myself in the mirrors and wondered what look you’d give to these wrinkles that have surrounded my eyes without yours. Would you recognize me with these gray hairs I didn't tell you about?

SANDRA
The street in front of your house seemed to be the same. The orange tree in the corner where the greengrocer's was, the paving stones at Don Giuseppe’s store - still broken -, the magnolia tree that would never bloom. But above all, the smell of the orange tree announcing your house was nearby. It all looked the same.

DUNIA

Your voice on the phone, cheerful and teasing, here and not there once again, the same old voice, and I swear I could have eaten up the receiver to eat your voice so that you’d never be gone again.

SANDRA (She turns her back on her)

I admit it - I was scared. The doorbell was there, tiny and glossy. It looks like a nipple, I thought, a nipple inviting the erotic—but no, this little nipple-doorbell was inviting me to the past and I was saying: should I touch it, should I not? I would stretch a finger and stroke it slowly, without pressing, in case I could excite it and make it ring. My finger was bringing you back to my memory.


DUNIA (She turns her back on her)
I looked at you through the peephole, which of us did I see? Years flashed by in the glass eye and did not let me see you.

SANDRA (She comes forward slowly with her back to Dunia)
My finger was still on the doorbell. A door was coughing weakly and I listened to it. The little moaning nipple would not need to be touched. I crossed the doorstep and rested my chest, my whole body, on the door.

DUNIA (She comes forward slowly with her back to Sandra)
I saw you and I pressed my body on the exact same place as you had placed yours. A door divided us and bound us. I was drowning and I thought: there’s no shore near here or any lifeguard in this place.

SANDRA
Your breathing in my ear was suffocating me, it didn't let me think. I was going crazy, I was fainting.

DUNIA
The air from your mouth made me warm, and I was getting filled with sweet old memories. The air from your mouth was burning me, immolating me.

SANDRA (Stands very close to Dunia’s back, without touching it)
Your fingers scratching the wood, scratching and moaning like a stray cat about to give birth to dead memories.

DUNIA
I felt you were sliding down the door to the floor and I reached out to stop you from hitting it.

SANDRA
Your back was sticking into mine, piercing me. I felt pain, I felt pleasure.

DUNIA

You were crying—and you never cried—in a way that was new to me.


SANDRA
You were crying and in your tears was the same old pain I always remembered.

DUNIA
I heard you say: you’re back at last.

SANDRA
And I heard you answer: at last I’ve returned.

(...)

A DOOR OPEN TO THE SEA by Viviana Marcela Iriart




Dr. Susana D. Castillo, University of San Diego, United States:

“…...the play explores the uprooting of its two characters on different levels. On one level, the play deals with the anxious reunion of two women separated for ten years…

Aptly, the initial encounter is choreographed as a slow dance in which the two women try to find each other—as if in a mist—while simultaneously suppressing the outward expression of their conflicting emotions… Thus, they will move—with caution and restraint—from reminiscence to laughter, from song to nostalgia, from distance…to the tango!...

(...) It is worth adding that Viviana Marcela Iriart—novelist and journalist—sought refuge in the Venezuelan Embassy at the age of 21, a period that marked the beginning of her exile, which would take her to various parts of the world before she settled in Venezuela…”





Available for sale on Amazon


 




Viviana Marcela Iriart (1958) is an Argentine-Venezuelan writer, playwright, and interviewer.


She has published 
"La Casa Lila" ( novel), "Interviews" (interviews with cultural figures, in English), and "¡Bravo, Carlos Giménez!" (biography). She compiled the free-to-read book "María Teresa Castillo-Carlos Giménez-Festival Internacional de Teatro de Caracas 1973-1992", a collaborative work with José Pulido, Rolando Peña, Karla Gómez, Carmen Carmona, and Roland Streuli.


"A DOOR OPEN TO THE SEA", as well as her forthcoming novel "Lejos de Casa", is based on her experiences with the Argentine dictatorsh






Rosalinda Serfaty Fedra Lopez en "Puerta Abierta al Mar" de Viviana Marcela Iriart en el Ateneo de Caracas: fotografìas de Roland Streuli, programa de mano, prensa, videos, rueda de prensa, homenaje a Esther Dita Kohn de Cohen / Caracas 2007












































Benjamín Cohen, Fedra López, Rosalinda Serfaty, Aníbal Grunn y viviana marcela iriart


Fotografías: ©Roland Streuli
Sala de Conciertos, Ateneo de Caracas, Venezuela.
Fotos del día sábado 14 de abril de 2007, día del estreno de la obra
Temporada en homenaje a Esther Dita Kohn de Cohen



PROGRAMA DE MANO

























PRENSA


Latin American Theatre Review, Kansas University, Dra. Susana D. Castillo











El Nacional, Caracas, Venezuela









El Nuevo País, Caracas

El Nacional

El Universal





Cartelera del Ateneo de Caracas

"Una Huella en el Teatro Venezolano", ediciòn "Espacio Anna Frank", Caracas 2008


El Mundo, Caracas





El Nacional, Caracas




El Nacional, Caracas


Revista Claro

Revista Zeta, Caracas


Notitarde, Valencia, Venezuela




El Globo, Caracas

Valla en el Centro Comercial Sambil, Caracas






El Universal


Revista Estampas, El Universal

La Prensa/The Press, California, Estados Unidos





El Nacional, Caracas



Esther "Dita" Kohn de Cohen con su nieto, Benjamín Cohen, recibiendo una placa por su aporte a la cultura venezolana. Sala de Conciertos,   Ateneo de Caracas, abril 2007.






Rueda de Prensa, Hotel Lido, Caracas

Benjamín Cohen,  productor; Esther "Dita"Kohn de  Cohen, la homenajeada; Rosalinda Serfaty y Fedra López, protagonistas de "Puerta Abierta al Mar" de viviana marcela iriart



Benjamìn Cohen, Esther "Dita" Cohen y Rosalinda Serfaty


Benjamín Cohen y Esther "Dita" Kohn de  Cohen





Myriam Pareja, actriz,  y viviana marcela iriart, autora de "Puerta Abierta al Mar"


Fedra López y Rosalinda Serfaty , protagonistas de "Puerta Abierta al Mar", entrevistadas por RCTV



viviana marcela iriart  entrevistada por VTV


Los elencos de las tres obras con Esther "Dita" Kohn de Cohen, Benjamín Cohen, autoras y directores
Periodistas

Aníbal Grunn, director de "Puerta Abierta al Mar" y "Casa en Orden"




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