The aim of Channels (Argentina) is to create opportunities for British and Argentine playwrights to work together to increase awareness and interest in each other's productions. The project involves collaboration between the National Theatre Studio, the British Council and the Buenos Aires International Festival.
Through a selection committee in both countries, two plays by contemporary dramatists from each country were selected for translation and adaptation into the other country's language.
British plays: - Gagarin Way by Gregory Burke
- Knives in Hens by David Harrower
Argentine plays: - La estupidez (Stupidity) by Rafael Spregelburd
- Dolorosa lucha de Maria por evitar que la serpiente se muerda la cola (Maria's Painful Struggle to Prevent the Serpent Biting its own Tail) by Marcelo Bertuccio
The writers of each work visit the other country to work on the final translation and adaptation with a playwright from that country. Rehearsed readings of the British plays by Argentine actors will take place within the Buenos Aires International Festival in September 2003 and the translated works are to be published. A similar process will be followed for the Argentine plays in the UK.
Channels started in 2000 as a British-French initiative. The idea of extending the project to Argentina emerged the following year.
After the Falklands War and the end of the dictatorship, Argentine theatre witnessed an unprecedented explosion in writing and directing. A new generation of playwrights, challenging traditional form and content, came to the fore. They have been dominating the alternative stage for some years and seem set to take over the institution. They are all writers and directors, normally choosing to direct their own plays. Foreign contemporary work is rarely staged. Argentine theatre practitioners tend to have a very basic and often outdated knowledge of British drama as university dramaturgy classes do not usually address works written later than Beckett and Pinter and there is also a huge gap in publishing, making it impossible to get hold of contemporary plays.
In the UK there is similarly little knowledge of contemporary Argentine theatre and drama. The ten years of broken relationships due to the Falklands War did not help and both countries missed out on the other’s latest creative developments. In the last few years a few Argentine theatre projects have reached the UK stage, demonstrating a growing interest in Argentine theatre.
The British Council supported the initial visit of Philip Lemoine of the National Theatre Studio to Buenos Aires and assisted in the co-ordination of negotiations between both parties on the selection of plays. In conjunction with the Buenos Aires International Festival, we co-ordinated and supported the visit by the British dramatists to work with Argentine dramatists on the adaptation of their works into Spanish. We negotiated the Festival’s involvement and are seeking support from Argentine counterparts to secure funding for the visit by Argentine dramatists to the UK.
You can get more information on Channels (Argentina) from Philippe Lemoine of the National Theatre Studio or Graciela Casabe and Alejandro Tantanián of the Buenos Aires International Festival.
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