El cantar del playo or... a song is a rose is a thorn

SELECTION HET THEATERFESTIVAL 2022

Last night I saw you in my mind on the dance floor. You were smiling at me. Mom is singing in the living room. The radio is on.  "How can I not admire you ... after all, you are forever in my head, my dreams and my heart. Love, my head spins. 

The romantic music of numerous Spanish-speaking artists from the 1960s is back in style... as these songs resonate through Costa Rican nightlife in the early 2010s. Plancha was the name later given to this genre. The genre that brought back to life the nostalgic music that our mothers and grandmothers listened to during household chores (after all, literally translated, música de plancha means "music for ironing"). The songs, which are all theatrical and often sing of the dreams and heartbreak of romantic love, lean close to the culture of the telenovelas and the art of the transformistas (drag queens). Fifty years later, plancha has become an emotional oasis for the capital's younger playo community and the music is used as an upbeat soundtrack to celebrate playo identity.

In his debut El cantar del playo... ("the singing of the faggot"), Mario Barrantes Espinoza transforms the scene into a landscape of memories. A place where melodrama, music and visual poetry express his personal search for queer sexuality and identity, from the perspective of a Central American migrant in Europe.

Awarded the Roel Verniers Prize of the TheaterFestival 2020.

The performance is in Spanish and English / 80 minutes