A scene, a text, a hundred men and 24 hours of performance to come. This summarizes the proposal of The second womanthe marathon of interpretation that María Hervás faces today (from 6:00 p.m.) at the Teatro Central in Seville. In it, the actress and her successors partners They play over and over a scene between a man and a woman in a relationship that has lost its creativity and romance, inspired by the film. Opening night by John Cassavetes. But the end result is unpredictable for each of them, because none of the hundred different Martys has ever met Virginia – the character played by Hervás – and most of them are not professional actors. An equally cinematic experience, as the audience is offered a wide-angle view of the action, while multiple cameras capture and share live close-ups.
Of course, before these 24 hours, there are 24 hours in which the protagonist must do a strong concentration exercise. “I’m a very diurnal person and for the first show we did in Barcelona I tried to change my habits and go to bed later and later. In the end it went badly for me, I ended up staying awake for 37 hours,” she recalls. “I’m quite capable of letting go of fear and nervousness, but when it comes time to deal with it, I start sleeping less well, these are things I can’t control, my meals are disorganized , my body demands more softness…”.
The result of a collaboration between the 2024 Greek Festival in Barcelona and the Teatro Central in Seville, this work directed by Anna Breckon and Nat Randall has the attraction for Hervás of not having done any rehearsal with any of his possible companions. “It’s the most exciting thing, being there and wondering who this human being is, why he looks at me like that, what his voice is like, his gestures. Finding the particularity of each of them,” explains- he said. “That’s one of the things we’re investigating. The second womanto what extent identity is a fixed thing, or is it a constructed construct in relation to the people in front of you. For me, it’s about connecting with strangers, trying to adapt to what that person is offering at that moment.
Listen to your own desire
But the development of editing allowed María Hervás to also explore hidden areas of herself. “One of the things it taught me is to connect to my own desire. We women have always been taught to satisfy male desire and cover our own. We have been so obedient since we were children, that when I wanted to ask myself what I wanted, I could not give myself an answer. My therapist once asked me and I said, “I don’t know.” “Well, we have to work to be connected to what you want,” he told me.
“I can do that in the play, and the directors put a lot of emphasis on that,” she continues. “If you want to laugh, do it, if you want to dance, do it. If you don’t want to, stop. There is something fanciful about all this seen from the outside, but it all starts from listening to one’s own desire. “It’s one of the most revolutionary things that can be done on stage.”
Does this imply, in some way, a feminist position? “I think the directors never mentioned this term, which doesn’t mean it’s not one,” Hervás says. “But I would go to humanism first, it is a work that greatly affects the connection between human beings. There is our vulnerability, our fear, our joy. It’s also more universal. He dialogues and questions a lot about the relationship between gender binarism. This makes it very easy for the viewer to see how entrenched we are in our roles. It is not my goal to dismantle it, but I allow myself to question it from where I am. »
How to eat seeds
After the aforementioned first experience in Barcelona, where “I didn’t expect much and I think the audience was also surprised”, Hervás is confident that the Seville event will once again be a blank slate that will be fulfilled. with completely different and unexpected situations. “The level of surprise is so high that there are people who think ‘come on, I’ll see two or three and I’ll leave’, but it’s like eating pipe, you can’t stop. And there are those who end up staying 24 hours a day.”
Finally, when asked if she is afraid of being a woman alone in front of so many men, Hervás remembers a recent survey in which many women were asked: if you walked alone at night in a forest , would you rather meet, a man, or a bear? And a high percentage said it was a bear. “It’s a failure of the brotherhood and understanding that should exist between the sexes,” he says. “But no, I’m not afraid. The difference with the daily life of a woman is that we are confronted with this hegemonic masculinity which objects us without having chosen it. This appears to us like an emergency situation in a jungle. Here I have chosen everything, consciously, to provide a framework that serves as a mirror to a community, the viewers, and from there we can draw conclusions and reflections on our behaviors. »
“Plus, I feel enthusiasm,” he concludes. “I’m putting forward something so that this community can analyze things that they don’t have time for in their daily lives. I feel very supported by the whole team, I take control of the show at all times and, if anyone violates me, I remove them from the stage immediately. And people sympathize so much with what’s happening on stage that if something happened to me, I’m sure they would jump up and eat anyone alive.”
