Repertorio Espanol's 33rd season begins Aug. 31 with the Festival of Dominican Theatre. Also scheduled for the season are Concierto En Mi, the world premiere of Vieques and La Pasión Según Antígona Pérez and Pilar Rioja.
Repertorio Espanol's ongoing productions, including the works of Carmen Rivera, Dolores Prida, Senel Paz, Garcia Lorca, Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Abelardo Estorino will also be seen during the rotating repertory season at Repertorio's Gramercy Arts Theatre.
Aiming to provide what they describe as the best of Latin-American, Spanish and Hispanic-American theatre in distinctive, quality productions, Repertorio executive producer Gilberto Zaldivar and artistic director Rene Buch announced that Repertorio will continue to provide "headsets on request with live simultaneous English translations to audience members for most productions."
The Festival of Dominican Theatre runs Aug. 31 - Sept 10 and comprises two plays which are written and directed by Dominican playwright Franklin Dominguez. In the first, Bailemos Ese Tango (Let's Dance that Tango), two aging actors attempt to re-ignite their artistic lives. In the second, Los Borrachos (The Drunks), three characters resort to drinking in order to fight each other, their loneliness and themselves. No English translation is available for this show.
Concierto En Mi features Carlos "El Gordo" Benjumea, Colombia's beloved comic actor, presenting a "cafe concert" featuring leading Colombia musicians and comics from television and theatre. Concierto En Mi runs Sept. 20-28. Jorge González' Vieques, which will be directed by Alfredo Galvá, won the 2000 Nuestras Voces Playwriting Contest, sponsored by The Metropolitan Life Foundation. Set on the U.S. Navy's controversial gunnery target island of Vieques, Puerto Rico, this comedy-drama deals with the life of a family during the 1950's, at the time when the U.S. Navy began its military exercises. This play starts its run Oct. 12.
Finally, Repertorio will present Luis Rafael Sánchez' La Pasión Según Antígona Pérez (The Passion According to Antigona Pérez), directed by Repertorio's René Buch. La Pasión explores "the many political situations and dictatorships of Latin America during the '60s and '70s.
The Gramercy Arts Theatre is located at138 E. 27 St. For ticket information and reservations please call (212) 889-2850.
-- By Murdoch McBride
