Here you have an interview
with Paloma Pedrero (Madrid, 1957) discussing her play Lauren’s Call…, as well as essential issues such as
education, sexuality, relationships, social prejudices, and her next projects.
I keenly invite you to enjoy the wisdom of her speech.
SPANISH GAY FICTION: Maybe
what attracts me most about Lauren’s Call… is the title. Why
did you choose Lauren Bacall among all the stars of Hollywood’s Golden Age? Did
you consider her the epitome of femininity? Or, on the contrary, did you find
her ambiguous?
PALOMA PEDRERO: She was very
feminine and also very masculine. She had both sides.
SGF: By the time the play was
first staged, the power of its language was highlighted. Nowadays we are used
to listen to the actors expressing this way on the boards but—by then, was it a
daring speech?
PP: In 1985, a woman speaking
about male sexuality with a really female look was revolutionary. I think today
it is still revolutionary.
SGF: What encouraged you to
write a play dealing with sexual ambiguity as not only a personal problem but
also a social one? Is it an issue you still find interesting?
PP: Yes, I still do find it
interesting, for we still behave under very strong social prejudices. I feel we
are educated to be heterosexual. But—what if not? I believe that, if we were
freer, we would enjoy many more possibilities in relationships. We could play
different roles in the heterosexual relationship and make it more creative.
There would also be more bisexuality, which means wide outlooks and
experiences.
SGF: Did José María Rodríguez
Méndez’s play Flor de Otoño (“Autumn Flower”), premiered a few
years before, have any influence when you wrote Lauren’s Call...?
In your opinion, what is the difference between your approach to
transsexualism/transvestism and Rodríguez Méndez’s play, or any other play of
that time?
PP: Honestly, I do not think so. The
play by the great author Rodríguez Méndez deals about male homosexuality. Lauren’s
Call… raises another issue. It discusses the limits that society puts
on human relationships, especially marriage. I think that a couple has to
be first and foremost the story of a great friendship…Sexuality should not be
the center point, but communication, tenderness, understanding—The
acceptance of the other’s differences, even his/her pathologies.
In order to enjoy a calm and long-lasting relationship, a couple must create,
reinvent itself as something unique. Society is still castrating in this sense,
setting strict rules that emerge from old, untrue ideas. For example, the way
each sex must behave in the relationship. This leads to continuous failure in
marriages.
SGF: Do you remember the
premiere of the play?
PP: Just imagine…My first
premiere as the author, as well as the female lead, in a hostile context. I
really did not know at the time the huge responsibility I was taking, the risk
I was running. Anyway, I think that, if I had realized, I would have done
the same. I also did not know play and staging could generate so much
controversy. I viewed Lauren’s Call… as a great love story, performed
with great affection by all the artistic crew. However, the critics and some
part of the audience reacted with hostility towards us. I just could not
believe it then. I later understood what had happened.
SGF: They say that it was
quite controversial in Spain back then. It has been several decades since the
premiere, and the play has still been producing. What is the audience response
in our days? Do you think the play is still shocking for the majority?
PP: I think it depends a lot
on the staging. If I were the director today, surely it would still be
shocking. There are so many things we do not know—dare to face—that we even do
not talk about them.
SGF: And abroad? What is the
reaction to Lauren’s Call… in other countries?
PP: As I have mentioned
before, I think it has always depended on how daring the mise-en-scène is.
SGF: Certain negative
criticism the play received on the premiere denotes not so much a problem with
your work as a playwright but rather some hostility towards the homosexual
issue. The play was premiered in Madrid in the mid-1980s—Would you say that
there was still a vast homophobic social mindset at the time?
PP: Yes, and it still does
exist. But, as I said before, Lauren’s Call… in 1985 did not
focus on Pedro’s homosexuality. Alberto Wainer, the director, made a
broader, richer interpretation. Why can’t this couple love each other, as this
is the case, and be happy? It could be possible if we accepted love in
different ways.
SGF: I consider this play is
ahead of its time. So ahead that it seems to me that today’s society has still
not absorbed its moral teaching. Let me explain—I still see parents
who bring up their little children doubtlessly certain that their sexual
behavior will be heterosexual when they will grow up. Boys will meet girls,
girls will meet boys—They never think about the fact that their offspring may
have a different sexuality since childhood. I think that is the reason why, the
time they grow up and come out or admit they feel trapped in
someone else’s body, some parents still find it so hard to accept. What is your
opinion on this matter?
PP: This is a very complicated
issue. We would need a congress to talk about this and would not achieve final
results. But yes—I do feel we still have not improved at all. People believe
that tradition (the usual…, the learned behavior) is the right thing. The
normal thing—And this is false. Mankind has lived and written with crooked
lines. What is normal? There is no normality. There are different humans
with different bodies, genes, substances, brains—That is why behaviors cannot
be the same. For example, how can you find normal that half of humanity has set
itself up as superior to the other half? There are so many things that we do
not know. We live in ignorance, but delightfully, when the only thing that
makes sense in life is making a path of knowledge and consciousness. In order
to do that, we must leave opinions and prejudices behind and start by looking
at ourselves, with no fear to know us. This is the only way we can see the
others, accept them, understand them, and even love them.
SGF: The play leaves a bitter
taste indeed. The understanding and generosity that Rosa displays at the end
imply a great sorrow and sacrifice—If you had written this play today, do you
think that you would have written the same ending?
PP: I would make Rosa realize
that it is possible, that Pedro could go to the Carnival party alone and she
could sleep in peace and joy. Or she could also go to the party. In the 1985
version, this is suggested. Rosa, when she is left alone, puts on Bogart’s
hat and tries to play and accept. But I still might be unsure by then—as
she was—Today, even with the same words, I would make her realize that it was
possible she could transform herself.
SGF: Do you see Rosa and
Pedro, each in their own way, as victims of strict education on sex roles in
the past? Could it be made a political interpretation, taking into account that
this play was staged in full democracy after several decades of dictatorial
regime?
PP: Absolutely. They are
victims of that strict, castrating education. But today’s education has
not changed as much as we feel. It is still strict and castrating. I
have recently published an article in La Razón[1] in
this regard. Here you have, just if you want to include it:
“Education”
by Paloma Pedrero
More laws, few considerable changes. We always do the
same without thinking twice, not daring to let the true thinkers take the reins
of such an essential issue. Almost all of us agree that education is the basis
on which mankind rises up. The world to come is growing in the school: an
ignorant place, seized by foolish power struggles, or a space where its inhabitants
are working to become wiser and better. So, to make this path we must teach our
children (apart from Maths and English) to know themselves in order to know the
others; to leave prejudices behind, to understand and respect other ways of
behaving and feeling. For a good teaching, you have to set love first. That
feeling must cover the classroom, the playground, the gym—To respect deeply and
let the teachers be independent. Practice what you preach. Teaching the hardest
thing for the human: being free, thinking by one’s self, running risks, making
efforts to find one’s talent. Transmitting your pupils that every joy comes
from one’s own effort. Educating is a sublime act, since good people result
from good teachers. People who understand that knowledge is a lifetime task.
That is why education must be reconsidered from different angles, less
materialistic and more focused on vocation.
Science, indeed—But together with Poetry and
Spirituality. The school as a place where you can find the gift that allows to
give our best to the others and the world. There will be no room for male
chauvinism, mistreatment of the different, or the shame of any kind of
violence.[2]
SGF: In the
original staging, in which you had the leading role, the so-called fourth wall was used as a mirror.
According to the play, both Rosa and Pedro get naked before the mirror. I
mentioned before the homophobia issue but, what about nudes? The Spanish
audience, after the Destape[3] age, was ready to see
clothless players on the boards? Or was it a controversial issue as well?
PP: It is always a
controversial matter. Nudity is a very touching thing.
SGF: What are your
projects? What are you working on?
PP: My play Ana el once de marzo ("Ana on March 11")[4] has just premiered. Now I am
doing some research to write a monologue about Mary Wollstonecraft, a British
feminist writer born in 1759. Her intelligence and courage were really
impressive. Her life was impressive too.
[1] This is one of the
most popular Spanish newspapers nationwide, in which Pedrero usually
collaborates.
[3] Destape (“Nudity”). After Franco’s death, the Transición
Española (“Spanish Transition”) began, a period of political
regeneration resulting in the current parliamentary monarchy. At that time, government
censorship became more relaxed, and the Spanish audience could thus see
actresses (and some actors) totally naked in films, as well as on stage, for
the first time. This trend is popularly known as el Destape.
[4] As the reader can
easily guess, this play is contextualized in the 3/11 train bombing in Madrid
ten years ago. It was the fiercest terrorist attack in Spanish history.
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