Theatre
The Car Cemetery
El cementerio de automóviles
Fernando Arrabal · 1958
Synopsis
In a car cemetery, rusted carcasses serve as rooms for a hotel run by Milos and Dila; those who live there, in hiding, care about eating and sleeping and remain indifferent to what goes on around them. Three musicians take refuge there, Emanu, the trumpeter, Foder, a mute saxophonist, and Topé, the clarinettist: the authorities have banned their music, and the police are looking for them. An athlete, Tiosido, and his trainer, Lasca, cross the stage. Each of the three musicians plays a role drawn from the Passion of Christ.
Context
Written in Spanish in 1957, in Paris, the play first appeared in French, in 1958, in the first volume of the author's theatre published by Julliard. It combines the absurd with religious parody: the Passion is transposed into a setting of scrap metal, among witnesses whom nothing touches. Victor Garcia staged it at the Théâtre d'Essai in Paris on 22 October 1965, in a production revived in Dijon in 1966. Richard Howard translated it into English as early as 1960, and Barbara Wright produced another version in London in 1962; French television filmed it in 1983.
Who it is for
A short, crude and provocative play; being able to recognise the episodes of the Gospel it subverts helps in following it.
Prizes and reception
The play has been staged in France, in Spain, where the Centro Dramático Nacional put it on, and in Argentina.
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