El pasado es un animal grotesco

About This Performance

Date
February 11, 2012
Venue
On the Boards | Seattle, WA
Duration
110 min
It’s 1999 in Buenos Aires. Mario, Laura, Pablo, and Vicky are in their mid-twenties and ready for careers, love, and adulthood. Over the next decade, Argentina’s economy will collapse and their lives will take a series of unexpected turns. In this fast-paced, multilayered “mega fiction,” director Mariano Pensotti deftly unfolds the lives of these 4 characters. El pasado es un animal grotesco is a funny and moving portrait that takes place atop a slowly spinning turntable stage. Guided by a narrative voice-over, we are granted access to a string of defining moments in the touching and tumultuous lives of the group. Moments that illustrate how quickly and easily real life can transform into fiction and back again.

Cast & Credits

Role Name
Text & direction Mariano Pensotti
Performers Pilar Gamboa, Javier Lorenzo, Santiago Gobernori, María Ines Sancerni
Set & costume design Mariana Tirantte
Light design Matías Sendón, (& Ricardo Sica)
Music Diego Vainer
Sound Engineer Demian Chorovicz
Assistant director Leandro Orellano
Technical and production assistant Juan Pablo Gomez

Extras

About The Artist

Mariano Pensotti

Mariano Pensotti, a young director and writer based in Argentina, has become one of the most noted experimental directors throughout the world. His unique sets and depictions of life are told with a filmic sensibility honed in years studying cinema at the Dramatic Arts Instituto Universitario Nacional de Artes. For his work he has won the prizes Rozenmacher, Clarin and Premio F; and the schollarships Unesco-Aschberg, Rockefeller Foundation, Fundación Antorchas and Casa de América de Madrid.

“[Pensotti creates] a compelling portrait of the self-obsession of his own generation that achieves that rare feat of profoundly moving an audience without ever descending into trite stereotypes or easy sentimentalism...The production is also blisteringly funny.”