美国国家公共电台 NPR Repertorio Espa?ol Celebrates 50 Years With A World Premiere

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MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

One of the oldest and most distinguished¹ Spanish-language theaters in the U.S. is New York's Repertorio Espanol. It presents hundreds of performances every year. This year, it's celebrating its 50th anniversary with a world premiere by a Pulitzer Prize winner. Jeff Lunden has more.

JEFF LUNDEN, BYLINE²: Repertorio Espanol performs in a converted Manhattan townhouse. It's tiny and kind of funky³.

ROBERT FEDERICO: It started actually as a private house, and then they took the backyard and made it into the stage area.

LUNDEN: Robert Federico, the company's executive producer, leads the way backstage...

FEDERICO: So be very careful.

LUNDEN: ...To very rickety wooden stairs.

FEDERICO: And now we've actually come up two flights to the dressing⁴ room area. This is where we store usually the small props⁵ in this hallway.

LUNDEN: And the sets are designed to be stashed⁶ flush against walls on either side of the stage behind black curtains.

FEDERICO: So let me show you a little bit more. As you can see, the scenery here is now for "Coronel" with even a cage for the rooster.

LUNDEN: The rooster is a co-star of "El Coronel No Tiene Quien Le Escriba" based on a novella by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

(SOUNDBITE OF ROOSTER CROWING)

FEDERICO: Yeah, OK.

LUNDEN: Repertorio Espanol was the brainchild of several exiled Cuban women who called themselves Las Artes. Their idea was to present classic Spanish plays in Spanish, says Robert Federico, who joined the company a few years later.

FEDERICO: When we started in 1968, most of the actors and artists and audiences were exiles from dictatorships - at that time, Argentina and Chile, Uruguay, Cuba, the violence in Colombia. Over the years, it's become less so as democracy flourished in Latin America and more economic exiles from the Dominican Republic and Mexico. Of course there were always a huge community of Puerto Ricans here.

LUNDEN: As the company and community evolved, so did the offerings. Repertorio has commissioned adaptations of Latin American novels and new plays.

NILO CRUZ: I think Repertorio's a little gem⁷ in this city, in this country. The work that they're doing is very special.

LUNDEN: Nilo Cruz has had three plays produced here and was asked to write a fourth specifically for the 50th anniversary.

CRUZ: One of the things that fascinates me about Repertorio is what they're able to do with their space and how they're able to transform it. But I find that with all their projects, language is the most important thing.

LUNDEN: Cruz's "Anna In The Tropics" made him the first Latino playwright⁸ to win the Pulitzer Prize for drama in 2003. It was produced on Broadway in English. Cruz translated it to Spanish for Repertorio.

(SOUNDBITE OF PLAY, "ANNA IN THE TROPICS")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As character, speaking Spanish).

LUNDEN: For non-Spanish-speaking audiences, the Repertorio provides simultaneous translations as text on a small screen on the back of the seats. The actors still come from all over the world, like German Jaramillo from Colombia. He plays the colonel opposite the rooster.

GERMAN JARAMILLO: Any actor in the Hispanic world wants to come to work here because it's a great honor to be part of this company.

LUNDEN: Another company member, Luis Carlos de la Lombana, was born in Spain.

LUIS CARLOS DE LA LOMBANA: We can be like a little embassy of the Latino reality not only in New York but in Latin America and South America. And that really transports you there. I mean, it's a great thing.

LUNDEN: He's been a leading man at Repertorio for 10 years, starring in such plays as an adaptation of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "Love In The Time Of Cholera⁹."

(SOUNDBITE OF PLAY, "LOVE IN THE TIME OF CHOLERA")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As character, speaking Spanish).

UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #3: (As character, speaking Spanish).

LUNDEN: More than a third of Repertorio Espanol's performances are for student audiences, part of the company's active education program. Again, Nilo Cruz...

CRUZ: How amazing that this young people are being introduced to Gabriel Garcia Marquez, to Lorca? How wonderful that in this country and through this theater the young people get to know some of the Spanish classics and some of the new work?

LUNDEN: And their parents appreciate it, too. Members of a book club made up of parents from the local middle school come to the theater every year to see adaptations of novels they've read. This time, it was "El Colonel."

ANGELA SILVERIO: We read the book, so when Repertorio decided¹⁰ to make the play, we said we have to be there.

LUNDEN: And Angela Silverio said it was great.

SILVERIO: You know, Repertorio always does a great job.

LUNDEN: With or without live roosters.

(SOUNDBITE OF ROOSTER CROWING)

LUNDEN: For NPR News, I'm Jeff Lunden in New York.