A Celebration of Culture

Hispanic theater heats up with a Cuban classic

Comments (0) By OCTAVIO ROCA Thursday, Jun 9 2005

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Piñera's style, on the page or the stage, embodies these tensions with sensual ease, the detached and humorous tone of his writing constantly at odds with the extreme situations lived by his characters. His play False Alarm, being presented during the current festival by Miami-Dade College's Teatro Prometeo, is drenched in fear of structures. His brilliant novel René's Flesh(La Carne de René) -- in which Piñera's prose remains as chaste as Saint Teresa's and as cool as the Marquis de Sade's -- is obsessed with the fear of pain. The Philanthropist, even in Raquel Carrió's radically cut version at Teatro Venevisión, approaches a frenzied fear of loneliness.

Loneliness is something Piñera knew well. It's something audiences everywhere will always recognize.

The Philanthropist: Virgilio Piñera's freely adapted theater of the absurd

Details

Through June 26. Venevisi�n International Theater, Riviera Plaza, 1560 S Dixie Hwy, Coral Gables Koubek Center, University of Miami, 2705 SW 3rd St, Miami; Miami Dade College North Campus, 11380 NW 27th Ave, Miami; Miami-Dade College Teatro Prometeo, Wolfson Campus, 300 NE 2nd Ave, Miami; Key Biscayne Community Center, 10 Village Green, Key Biscayne; Florida Center for the Literary Arts, 300 NE 2nd Ave, Miami; Tower Theater, 1508 SW 8th St, Miami; Broward Center for the Performing Arts, 201 SW 5th Ave, Fort Lauderdale; Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne, 455 Grand Bay Dr, Key Biscayne. 800-494-8497, 305-663-5410 (Venevisión), 305-445-8877 (other venues).