Ay Carmela!

AY CARMELA, by Jose Sanchis Sinisterra

Paulino, Carmela & Gustavete are troubadours during the Spanish Civil War. They are Republicans and stray into Nationalist territory. Arrested, they fear death but receive a reprieve from an Italian commander who loves the theatre. He proposes a deal: a performance for the Fascist troops - a burlesque of the republic, in exchange for freedom. Paulino agrees, but will the fiery and patriotic Carmela consent?

WHY

• Spanish Civil War — specific time period, not to remote

• An allegory for our current politics, division, and the resurgence of strongmen

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• Setting: theater/prison theater/cabaret

• Spanish/English, or bilingual

• Character driven, great character development and clarity

• Can be small, or medium, adaptable to larger via chorus.

• Does not need to be too large

• Specific, emotionally powerful music - flamenco, civil war songs

• Picks up where Carmen left off

• Possibility for dancing (flamenco)

• Central question: The price of compromise, the price of idealism

CHARACTERS

Carmela: Fiery, impractical, passionate, uncompromising. A proud, loving and defiant wife to Paulino.

Paulino: Cowardly, practical, uxorious, compromising. A cautious man forced to suppress his leftist tendencies.

Gustavete: A deaf-mute, he is gentle, child like and faithful to Paulino, and especially to Carmela.

Lieutenant Ripamonte: A man of the theater, a failed director. A seeming victim of circumstance, as he’s become an agent of Franco’s fascism, he is also unprincipled and compromised.

Polish Soldier: Small role. Soldiers: Chorus Prisoners: Chorus

SYNOPSIS

Ay, Carmela! takes place in the 1930s Spain. Husband & Wife Carmela & Paulino, and Gustavete - mute as the result of an explosion - are a trio of vaudeville performers. Among the chaos of the Spanish Civil War, they’re in Montejo, to entertain republican troops. Paulino is motivated as much by self-preservation as patriotism. Their show begins with Carmela singing and dancing. The audience is enthusiastic, but the mood changes when Nationalist planes are heard overhead.

The show continues with a poem by Antonio Machado, followed by a routine in which Paulino twists himself into a pretzel in an attempt to break wind. For thefinale Carmela appears representing justice while Paulino brandishes the republican flag and they sing “Ay Manuela, Ay Carmela”.

Following these dangers, they plan to return to Valencia- safer and better food. Carmela distracts a truck driver while Paulino and Gustavete steal fuel. They start the

journey on a misty night and end up in Nationalist territory. Incriminated by the Republican flag in their car, they’re arrested and placed in the local school, which serves as the prison camp. Amid mounting tension and terror, prisoners are taken away and shot. Carmela, Paulino and Gustavete are driven away, convinced they’re going to be killed.

Instead they’re taken to the local theater where they meet an Italian Officer, Lieutenant Amelio di Ripamonte. He wants them as a part of a show he is charged with producing, to entertain visiting Nationalist troops, and, rumor has it, Generalissimo Franco. The lieutenant proposes a deal — a burlesque of the republic in exchange for their freedom. Paulino begins to rewrite their old script, for the Nationalists. Carmela rebels, following her fiery conviction as an anti-fascist. Paulino persuades her that with their lives at stake, she must go along with the performance.

On the day of the show Carmela has her period, and Paulino has an stomach upset after eating a rabbit which Gustavete, writing on his slate, confirms was a cat. The Polish prisoners, brought to watch the mockery of their ideals, upsets Carmela, causing her to refuse to complete the number with the flag, a reversal of the one they performed for the Republican troops. Musical numbers are followed by a poem read by the Lieutenant. The third act is a comic sketch, "The Republic goes to the Doctor", in which Paulino plays an effeminate Republican doctor visited by a female patient, the Spanish Republic, played by Carmela. Claiming that she has been made pregnant by a Russian lover, played by Gustavete, she invites the doctor to insert his

thermometer, but the doctor must confess that is broken.

Carmela, increasingly irritated by the mockery of the Republic, abandons the skit, throwing the fascist audience into a frenzy by displaying her breasts and intoning the Republican party–motto. A Nationalist officer rises from the audience and shoots Carmela. Gustavete, suddenly finding his voice for the first time, calls out to her in an anguish, but Carmela falls to the floor dead. Sometime later, Paulino and Gustavete visit Carmela's rudimentary gravesite to decorate it with flowers and the latter’s chalk board, since Gustavete has regained his voice. The only words here are spoken by Gustavete – "Come on, Paulino" – as he leads him away. As the two men take the road once again, the song "¡Ay Carmela!" is heard in the soundtrack.

LINKS

Film Song Play