En défense de l’honneur de la comedia de Castilla. En trois actes: 1635, 1792, 1830

La querelle du Cid and la bataille d’Hernani show how much French theatre was dependent on Spain: the Spanish comedia used to be criticised for its irregularity by the classics (Voltaire) and praised for liberality by the romantics (Hugo). The article presents three moments in the history of Spanish theatre and its political involvement. (1) Idea de la comedia de Castilla by José Pellicer de Ossau y Tovar, who defined twenty rules of Spanish comedia in 1635, is analysed in the context of the theatre activity at the very moment when the king of France decided to declare war on the king of Spain. (2) La comedia nueva o el café by Leandro Fernández de Moratín, a metatheatrical master-piece, is presented as a confrontation of the Enlightenment with traditional Spanish theatre. (3) Aben Humeya by Francisco Martínez de la Rosa, a Spanish liberal exiled in Paris, and its French premiere in July of 1830 shows the implication of politics and theatre in both France and Spain.

Enemy Treasures : The Making and Marketing of Spanish Comedia in the Amsterdam Schouwburg

The establishment in 1638 of Amsterdam’s first public theatre venue, the Schouwburg, caused a major enhancement and upgrading of local stock repertory. Spanish comedia was the new fuel. With Lope’s drama first, Spanish plays and playwrights were brought to the Schouwburg stage in a serial production. Crowds gathered for anything Spanish, and Spain’s victory over Dutch theatre life was complete even before the war was over in 1648. The paradox of Spain’s triumph in the heart of Dutch culture is centre stage in this contribution, exploring both the transfer route through Amsterdam’s Sephardic community, which facilitated so much successful import of enemy treasures, and analysing the public presentations that framed the Spanishness of the plays and playwrights as a new trademark for the Amsterdam crowds.

Askance, athwart, aside: the queer plays of actors, auteurs and machines

This chapter juxtaposes the Spanish ‘comedia de mariquitas’ [‘poofter comedy’] No desearás al vecino de quinto (Ramón Fernández, 1970) with Lucrecia Martel’s La niña santa (2004). By dissecting Alfredo Landa’s performance in No desearás al vecino de quinto, the chapter studies how the actor’s on-and off-screen persona as modern-day everyman and his flamboyant character highlight the split between actor and his craft. It also shows how this performance brings to fore a queer performance of identity that dovetails with the ‘queer sensibility’ of Martel’s directorial hand. While insisting on the multiple positions available to queerness, particularly in two films that seem to teeter on its edge, this chapter questions what it can mean to perform humanity through utterances, gestures and glances, through objects, positions, and gestures.