Versión español

Emilio S. Belaval (1903-1972)

In 1939, Emilio Belaval said he hoped that one day there would be "a great Puerto Rican theatertheater: A literary genre generally containing dialogue and created for the purpose of being performed on a stage before an audience. where everything is ours: the subject, the actors, the decorative motifs, the ideas, the aestheticaesthetic: 1. Pertaining to the perception or appreciation of beauty. Aesthetic pleasure. 2. Artistic, of a beautiful and elegant appearance.." From that moment, he began to promote the formation of a native theater movement, which he himself stimulated both in theory and in practice. As the director of the Club Artístico of del Casino de Puerto Rico, and later as the president of the Puerto Rico Atheneum, Belaval fostered the development of a purely Puerto Rican theater.

During his presidency, the Atheneum sponsored a dramadrama: Refers to literary pieces and selections that display drama-like characteristic. writing competition in which Esta noche juega el joker, by Fernando Sierra Berdecía, and El clamor de los surcos, by Manuel Méndez Ballester, were awarded prizes. Together, Méndez and Belaval brought together the most important players in the theater world of Puerto Rico to create the Sociedad Dramática Areyto. This drama society set out three fundamental goals: to stage works by contemporary Puerto Rican authors, to implement new production techniques, and to attract a permanent body of theater goers who would support works of quality.

During its short life (1940-1941), Areyto produced two of the most important works in Puerto Rican theater: Mi señoría, by Luis Rechani Agrait – a political comedycomedy: A theatrical or cinematographic piece in which the action is predominantly pleasant, festive, or humorous, and which has a happy ending. The form is of Greek origin and generally has a social archetype as a main character. The situations are usually taken from daily life, in which the conflicts of values and ethics in the society are depicted. about a political naïf and his slow but sure corruption – and Tiempo muerto, by Manuel Méndez Ballester – a tragedy about Puerto Rican country folk faced with poverty and shame. In both works, languagelanguage: An oral communication system, which usually also includes writing, associated with a human community; tongue. assumes great importance as a resource in the faithful development of the characters. An analysis of these texts reveals the political, social, and economic panorama of Puerto Rico at the beginning of the decade of the 1940s.

Esta noche juega el jóker, El clamor de los surcos, Mi señoría, and Tiempo muerto are an answer to the thematic and aesthetic requirements of Belaval's manifesto: "Our theater must be, first and foremost, a theater about society, a theater that is close to the people."

In 1941, the artistic director of Areyto, Leopoldo Santiago Lavandero, founded the Teatro Universitario, an important institution in the development and preparation of the people involved in Puerto Rico's theater. In 1946, taking La Barraca, by Federico García Lorca, as a model, the Teatro Universitario acquired a mobile unit so that it could take comedies into the communities and so reach a heterogeneous audience for its productions. The emphasis, however, fell on productions of universal dramaticdramatic: Pertaining to the drama. works, which left Puerto Rican theater to one side and offered little stimulus in the formation of playwrights. The Teatro Universitario and later its successor, the Drama Department of the University of Puerto Rico, fulfilled the second goal of Areyto: to prepare and educate directors, set designers, actors, lighting technicians, wardrobe designers, and make-up artists – artistic talent able to implement new and diverse production techniques in all its wide variety.

As a result, during the decade of the 1940s, the institutions were formed that would continue supporting the Puerto Rican theater movement. The Sociedad Dramática Areyto became the model for the new independent companies. For its part, the Puerto Rico Atheneum continued to sponsor competitions in play writing and later became the venue of the annual avant-garde theater festival. In turn, the Teatro Universitario / Department of Drama undertook to train its members both technically and academically. Simultaneously, native subject matter was becoming more clearly defined and came to characterize the tradition that the Mexican historian, Carlos Solórzano, said was "the most organic, homogeneous, and interesting nationalist theater in Latin America."