From 'Lost Paradise' to the 'queer' series: the director of the Barcelona Grec festival, Cesc Casadesús, recommends his favorite shows

Cesc Casadesús, director of the Grec, with the faun symbol of the festival. Gianluca Battista

The Grec summer festival is here, the great summer artistic event in Barcelona, ​​with a program of 86 theatre, music, dance and circus shows and finally, after the Via Crucis of the pandemic, without restrictions of any kind.

The inauguration, on Wednesday June 29, is carried out by the prestigious company Nederlands Dans Theater (NDT 1), which will offer three choreographies (one of them a recent premiere by the Valencian Marina Mascarell) that show a wide range of the ways of Dance.

A true torrent of creations will follow that will mark the summer nights, especially from the epicenter of the festival, the Grec amphitheater on Montjuïc mountain, the traditional setting for unforgettable evenings.

The director of the festival, Cesc Casadesús,

More information

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"The Grec 2022 is very complex and vast, and very diverse, because we have to cover very different audiences," he warns.

“Making a selection is something very personal and risky, but having to choose there are several very special things that I wouldn't miss out on.

In any selection of the Grec program there must of course be some amphitheater shows, where magical nights always take place in the open air.

For me, one of them will surely be the meeting of the Portuguese singer Salvador Sobral and the Menorcan pianist Marco Mezquida on July 23.

It's the evening I look forward to the most."

Casadesús adds the concert at the amphitheater of the Barcelona and National Symphony Orchestra of Catalonia (OBC) —which has not performed at the Grec since 1991—, which will offer Mahler

on July 22 , with audiovisual projections of the artist Alba G. Corral.

"It gives me goosebumps in advance," emphasizes the director of the festival.

In the selection of Casadesús, also, the presence of The Wooster Group, the legendary American company (among its founders is Willem Dafoe) behind which he has been, he explains, four years, and which will offer

, a show based on the reinterpretation of a folk album recorded by black prisoners in a segregated prison in the State of Texas (this montage will be seen at the Teatre Lliure de Montjuïc, another of the Grec stages, from July 13 to 15 ).

The director also selects a very special theatrical show:

to be seen at the Teatre Nacional de Catalunya (TNC), from July 1 to 3, performed by actors with Down syndrome.

“I really recommend it, it is not a social show, it is a production of Shakespeare that asks for an artistic gaze without any condescension.

The story of Hamlet is there and the actors also talk about what it means to be different, their experiences, sex, aspirations.

I'm especially excited to have him."

The director takes the opportunity to talk about the social involvement of the Grec, something that seems to be required of all public theater in the city of Mayor Ada Colau and Barcelona en Comú.

“The social has to be there to explain something, not because it is or because of self-indulgence;

you have to touch on the issues that concern and interest people, but the artistic must always be the main criterion and, for me,

It has to be above everything."

Colau, when presenting the programming, congratulated himself on the parity.

“Once again it is the same, parity is always with artistic demands, not by quota”.

A scene from the Nederland show that will open the Grec 2022.CRAHI REZVA

Seises

, the combination of Israel Galván's baile and the voices of the Escolanía de Montserrat (Marcat de les Flors, July 2 and 3), is another of Casadesús's recommendations.

“It is a dance solo based on the 16th century tradition of the dance of six children in the cathedral of Seville that plays with flamenco and the ideas of innocence and martyrdom.

I didn't want to bring an easy flamenco”.

The festival opens with the Nederlands, is opening with dance safe?

“The Grec amphitheater is a space that likes dance, and in which theater is more difficult to program.

Having said that, it is clear that I, despite my career in the genre, have not normally chosen to start with dance”.

At the festival it will be possible to see

with Christina Rosevinge, which premieres in Mérida.

“Yes, here it will be seen at the Romea;

We run away a bit from the formula of the Mérida festival, which has a more tourist component (at the Grec only 7% is foreign public, 80% is from Barcelona and the metropolitan area), of doing classics with well-known actors;

the line of the Grec is more contemporary, you can make a classic from time to time, but the public of Barcelona prefers more contemporary works”.

The director recommends three other plays that will be seen at the amphitheater:

, by the Compañía Nacional de Teatro Clásico, in a production by Xavier Albertí (July 3 and 4),

by Oriol Broggi and La Perla 29, the wonderful fellinian journey that the company has staged for four weeks in Paris (July 11 and 12), and

theatrical version of Milton's great poem, directed by Andrés Lima (July 26 and 27 of July).

“It is a very intelligent adaptation, by Helena Tornero, with Pere Arquillué playing God, and reflections on the theatrical act and the condition of being an actor”.

Casadesús says that one should not miss the opportunity to see

“of the great Romeo Castellucci” (Lliure, July 23 and 24), an extraordinary show that could be seen in the last High Season of Girona.

“It was necessary to bring him to Barcelona, ​​the city has to see Castellucci.

In a festival you need powerful shows, real tractors that drag, and of these, which are not abundant, we have two, the one by Castellucci and

, Thomas Ostermeier's version and the Berlin Schaubühne of Ibsen's work (Lliure, July 2 and 3)”.

A moment from 'An Enemy of the People'.Thomas Aurin

The director considers it necessary to highlight "young, new-generation shows that will not appeal to everyone, but force one to leave the comfort zone", and mentions

of The Count of Torrefiel, who was in Avignon ("there is to see”) and

, by Cris Blanco.

He recommends not missing Jane Birkin (amphitheatre, July 19), "a bit of

at a festival that features fado and Italian song."

And he thinks that what will hit the festival and he can't stop recommending it, despite the fact that tickets are already sold out, is the surprising

at the National Art Museum of Catalonia (MNAC), on July 5 and 6, a play about museum guards.

And of course, the Mulinex cycle, the “hybrid scene”, rogue,

and “transfeminist” programming at El Molino, which for two weekends will take over the emblematic venue of Music Hall del Paralelo, currently owned by the City Council of Barcelona.

Curated by Vicent Fibla / Festival Eufònic, the Mulinex program is a celebration of diversity and sexual dissidence with scenic arts, music and

featuring 15 figures such as Flamenco Queer, Teknodrag, Hidrogenesse, Raval Cuir, Mikey Woodbridge, Gloria Viagra (a two meter twenty celebrity in the

and LGTBIQ+ from Berlin, known as “the Empire State of drags”), Anneke Nekro or Aka Teatre.

Doesn't Casadesús fear the reaction to such a radical proposal at a public festival?

“It is a playful and reflective proposal, with activism and debate.

It is not about being provocative, although there are things that can be uncomfortable, but there is a scene in Barcelona that is buzzing with this and programming the most interesting makes perfect sense, even more so in a place of memory like El Molino”.

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