The Argentine theater opens a house in Madrid

From left to right, Gerardo Otero, Claudio Tolcachir and Lautaro Perotti pose last week for EL PAÍS in the Timbre 4 room in Buenos Aires.SOL SCHILLER

In 2001, you had to ring the bell number 4 on a street in the Boedo neighborhood, in the south of Buenos Aires, to access a theater school and also an exhibition space with just 50 seats. In fact, it was a large and dilapidated apartment that had previously been a shoe factory and that served as the headquarters of a company that decided to baptize itself Timbre 4. There he installed his home, in addition, the playwright, director and actor Claudio Tolcachir (Buenos Aires, 46 years), one of its founders together with the actor and director Lautaro Perotti (Buenos Aires, 47 years old). Little by little, the project grew and in a few years they became a benchmark not only in Argentina, but in general in Latin American theater and also in Spain. Especially since 10 years ago they premiered at the Spanish theater in Madrid

, the work of Tolcachir, their presence and success have been growing and today they are two well-established names in the Spanish drama scene.

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Twenty years later, that special space that was born in Buenos Aires in the midst of the economic recession opens a house in Madrid. It will be in September, in a small place at street level on Arganzuela street, in the La Latina neighborhood. At the moment, only as a school, the first to open this theater group after the one in Buenos Aires, but with a long-term project, with different workshops aimed at both inexperienced actors and those who are starting in the profession or professionals, and also teenagers. “We want a warm and useful space with a lot of work and discipline, but in which pleasure is always present, a meeting place for teachers and students that offers security and confidence to go out to work,a classroom where the actor is offered the necessary tools to develop his own individuality, in a very intimate and particular way ”, an enthusiastic Tolcachir celebrates by phone, who will be the director of the school and who will move next year to Madrid, where She already has a school reserved for her two children. Perotti and Gerardo Otero, another member of the company, will also teach.

Entrance to the new headquarters of Timbre 4 in Madrid. Andrea Comas

While Timbre 4 in Buenos Aires grew and more bells were added, more seats (up to 200 today) and the school rooms, multiplied with workshops, seminars and a thousand projects, Tolcachir and Perotti dreamed of a similar project in Madrid. They love teaching and both have given in recent years numerous workshops and seminars for all types of interpreters in Spain. “We wanted a long-range teaching project, beyond short-term workshops or seminars, a space of our own where we could put together our quilombo. School is a place of purity, of freedom, where egos relax and disappear, it is a place of encounter and discoveries, of communication and stimulation, a space where risk jumps and one places oneself in the best place in the world ”, Tolcachir assures,for whom the central point of teaching is creativity. "Each actor has his own individuality, the teacher has to help him and give him the necessary tools to find his own unique and particular development as a performer", adds the director, who in the first week of October premieres his work at the Piccolo in Milan

, with an Italian cast, which also plans to release in Spain later with Spanish actors.

“More than a jump, Madrid is something that has been built. We have been here for many years and everything has happened naturally ”, also says from Buenos Aires Perotti, who remembers when he arrived in the capital of Spain for the first time with

, as an actor. "How could it not be Madrid? I would sit in the Plaza de Santa Ana, in front of the Spanish Theater, and I would find myself at home, surrounded by so many people with whom I agreed artistically. It has always been like this ”, confesses the actor, who this fall will continue his tour as director of the play

, with Carlos Hipólito and Mapi Sagaseta. “As a teacher, my goal is to break my head to help each actor and actress find their own voice and uniqueness,” adds Perotti.

There will be five workshops with which Timbre 4 will begin in Madrid, modulated quarterly and with end-of-year assignments. Classes, between 15 and 20 students, will be taught morning and afternoon. The initiation workshop will be given by Gerardo Otero; the two dedicated to students with different levels of experience will be given by Perotti and the workshop for professional actors will be given by Claudio Tolcachir. There will also be another for teenagers that Lara Ruiz will teach. The doors of the Madrid room will also be open to proposals and projects from other artists.

Timbre 4 in Madrid will not subtract an iota of strength from that of Buenos Aires.

It will be an excellent complement.

The sound of that bell in the Boedo neighborhood will now also be heard in La Latina de Madrid, as a space that seeks to be an international bridge between Spain, Latin America and Europe.

"We seek to cross people," Tolcachir confesses.

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