Ramon Ayres, Andres Velasquez and others
Ephemeral Ensemble
HOME, Manchester
April 10-11, 2024: 1 hour
After making a big impression at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe last year, this five-person tribute to the “Disappeared” of Argentina’s past is on a UK tour. Rewind is still very much the same show, it seems, and its direct and vivid use of modest means is still its greatest strength.
There’s an introduction, a sequence of sketch-like reconstructions of what led to the death and disappearance of Alicia – a young woman who did nothing worse than join an anti-government demonstration – and of the conclusions of those who found and identified her in a mass grave… and finally a solemn reminder that she was just one of many.
A description is “mimed archaeology” – bringing back to life facts revealed through careful scientific inquiry, because those facts deserve to be told.
Much of it is done through movement and simple lighting, with brilliant use of acetates on a mobile overhead projector (I thought we’d seen the last of those long ago, but it’s remarkable what you can do with one): Josephine Tremelling (also a performer) gets the credit for lighting design. And there is music: Alex Paton performs live and is an effective one-man band with the help of a sequencer and some very clever ideas (and his colleagues).
Andres Velasquez introduces the story and holds it together, and the other performers are Eyglo Belafonte and Louise Wilcox. Part of the 30th ¡Viva! Spanish and Latin American Festival at HOME, it’s what they call physical theatre – you could also call it meaningful political theatre, as the company is keen to draw parallels with injustice and guilt in Latin America and elsewhere today, and proclaims: “By digging into the past, we build a future”.
Entertainment? Maybe not primarily – the story is too serious for that to be the main impression, and the structure means it can hardly gain pace after re-telling what happened on one day of violence. It’s more a commemoration, and a witness to truth that should not be forgotten.
More info and tickets here