Gabriela Furtado Coutinho recounts the evocative and spirit-like quality to recent theatrical events.
English cannot hold my heart; there’s no word in the language for my visceral reactions to theatre this past month. In Brazilian Portuguese, we have words for belly laughs-turned-cries caught in the chest and sobs that heave with the rhythm of laughter: “chorar de rir,” “chorar de soluçar.” So powerful were the evocative tales of lineage this month. Theatre transported us across time and back to intimate corners of our souls in Pericles, Azira’i, Chicago Lore(s), Jocey y Las Mariachis, Becky Nurse of Salem, and By the Way, Meet Vera Stark.
I was working on my new POTUS piece, chronicling productions that have provided sanctuary to audience members across the nation, when I rushed to Chicago Shakespeare Theater this past Friday to catch the sweeping Pericles, a late Shakespeare play of ancient Greek proportions, and the vehicle of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Chicago return. I would sit in a dark, enlightened space again at Navy Pier on Sunday for the Destinos-sponsored Azira’i, Zahy Tentehar’s one-woman “musical of memories,” performed in both Brazilian Portuguese and Ze’eng eté.
I tried to make sense of the soluçar (the laugh-sob). What was it about this month? We had many opportunities to mourn and laugh, through characters’ circumstances or in connecting their past to our present. There has also been much to mourn: We lost, for instance, Ken Page and Gavin Creel. There is much to yearn for, especially with the upcoming election. But humor and movement offer a balm, from expressive asides to the audience and Suzuki-like choreo in Tamara Harvey’s Pericles to Zahy Tentehar’s light-hearted humility and shamanic song in Azira’i. Tentehar told me, “I see my play as a ritual. I don’t try to protect myself from the emotions; I let myself experience everything and connect.” I followed suit and let go.
