“Timón”: an invitation to insult the powerful

“Matrons, turn lewd! Abandon your children, obedience! Slaves, fools, pluck the grave and rugged Senate from its seat, and rule in its stead! (…) Bankrupt men, don’t give in, and instead of paying back, draw your knives and cut the creditors’ throats! Steal, servants! Rebellious bandits are your venerable masters, who steal by appealing to the laws. Maid, to your master’s bed, for your mistress is in the brothel! (…) May piety, fear, the religion of the gods, peace, justice, truth, family respect, rest at night and good neighborliness, instruction, manners, trades, occupations, hierarchies, traditions, customs and laws degenerate into their confusing opposites, and then confusion continues to reign!

Anyone who sees Bruno Oder interpreting Timón’s furious monologue will make you want to go out on the street to repeat it. It is part of the magic of theater: when a play that has been written for 400 years, reconnects with the most urgent reality. The actor, recognized for classics of the Shakespeare repertoire such as Hamlet, The Tempest or Henry V, suddenly assumes the leading role of one of the lesser-known works of the Bard of Avon. And with regard to the tune with the fury that exists today in the streets due to the ineptitudes of the government, he never ceases to be surprised that the theme of the work is so close: The wealthy Timon lives in Athens lavishing gifts, feasts and favors, accompanied by a court of sycophants. Yet when his waste brings him to ruin, none of those he favored will succor him. Dejected by treachery, Timon retires to the field to dig his grave, and as he digs he utters the most bitter and splendid insults, calling on heaven for the annihilation of Athens, the land of his disenchantment. “I think we’ve all felt like Timon at some point or behaved like him. That’s the great thing about Shakespeare: as long as the world doesn’t change, his works will never go out of style”, reflects the actor.

“Timón” never ceases to amaze us by the levels of hate that it reaches. Starting with his rudeness, but also with his need to bury himself and destroy everything. It makes us think how far human beings can go to hate others. The work is a metaphor for how we can dig to the point of deepest human pain. And that interested me”, says director Mateo Chiarella.

“Coco Chiarella had a lot of fun playing with the audience’s imagination so that they would complete the story. He had a child’s heart and was well aware of it.”

Bruno Oder Actor

Indeed, in the play Shakespeare turns the diatribe into one of the fine arts. For Odar, this is proof that theater is always a visionary activity. “Because it is a ritual, theater always has a connection with reality. We are like sorcerers, part of the mystery of the theater is its ability to notice those invisible things that are in the air, as in this case the political problem. I am sure that Coco Chiarella would have loved to premiere a work like this at the height of the situation”, he affirms.

The mention of the late director is not free. This free version of his wife, Celeste Viale Yerovi of the play “The life of Timon of Athens” is already being premiered in person at the CCPUCP as a tribute to the director who died in April last year, directed by his son Mateo Chiarella Viale and starring one of his fetish actors. Indeed, “Timón” has a lot to do with the personality and attitude of the late man of theater. Odar, who starred in four of the works directed by Jorge Chiarella (Amadeus, Street Shoes, Enrique V and History of a horse) acknowledges that there was a special understanding between the two. “Coco was such a natural director that his instructions were very intuitive. With Coco we were like two children playing, everything arose from intuition. Our connection was not about us getting along great, but that whatever discussions we might have, the solutions we found together always worked,” he recalls.

In Timón, both actor and director have recovered many of Jorge Chiarella’s practices for staging, trying, as Odar warns, to recover the magic of suggestions. “Coco had a lot of fun playing with the audience’s imagination to get them to complete the story. He had a child’s heart and was well aware of it. That’s why his rehearsals were pure play. I loved his way of taking risks on stage and working with the scenic space. Coco worked a lot with the viewer’s point of view,” he explains.

For Mateo Chiarella, in a tribute to his father, the presence of an actor like Odar could not be missing, whom he defines as one of the most plastic actors in our environment. “He must be the one who best poses his body and his voice so that you have the exact information of what he is doing on stage. It is a personal gift. That sounds awesome to me, and that’s why my dad loved it so much,” he adds.

More information

Place: Theater of the PUCP Cultural Center. Av. Camino Real 1075. San Isidro. Season: From April 9 to June 5, Saturdays and Sundays 8 pm Tickets: S/ 45 and S/ 20. On sale only at www.ccpucpencasa.com