La fanesca.

'La Fanesca' is one of the very first plays created by Ecuadorian theater group Malayerba. Collectively created in 1984 under the direction of founding member Susana Pautasso, the play is based on texts by María Escudero. A 'fanesca' is a traditional Ecuadorian dish, a rich soup made of a variety of ingredients, typically prepared and served only in the week before Easter; this play is inspired on this traditional dish, bringing together carnivalesque characters from the diversity of cultures and ethnicities present in Ecuadorian society. The performance portrays, by means of the masked voices of society's underdogs, the fractured, unofficial history of Ecuador and its rich cultural heritage as a 'mezcla de todo' (a 'mixture of everything'): the diverse worldviews, cultures, and backgrounds, not only of native Ecuadorians but also of the migrants and exiles assimilated - or not - to Ecuadorian society. This video documents the performance of 'La Fanesca' as presented in the Festival Iberoamericano de Teatro (FIT) de Cádiz, held in Spain in 1987. The Grupo de Teatro Malayerba (teatromalayerba.org) was founded in Quito in 1979 by Arístides Vargas, Susana Pautasso and María del Rosario 'Charo' Francés, immigrant actors originally from Argentina and Spain. From the start, Malayerba included actors with various backgrounds and nationalities, invested in the exploration of the rich cultural diversity and complex history of Ecuador, as well as issues of migration, exile, political violence and individual and collective memory. With over 25 years of ongoing theater practice and more than 20 plays performed locally and internationally for a diverse audience, Malayerba is committed to theater pedagogy and experimentation, artistic collaboration, and community building. They have represented Ecuador in national and international theater festivals; they have also collaborated with theater groups within Ecuador and in other countries, and performed for both film and television, while engaging in community work in Quito. In 1989 the group created the Laboratorio Malayerba, committed to the training of generations of young Ecuadorian actors and to an ongoing investigation of theories and practices of experimental theater. In 2001 Malayerba launched the theater journal 'Hoja de Teatro, ' conceived as a forum for the theorization, criticism and dissemination of Ecuadorian theater practices. The group also runs a theater house, the Casa Malayerba, which houses the Laboratory as well as a theater with seating capacity for seventy people. Malayerba approaches theater making as an artistic, ethical and technical realm where to engage in meaningful creative experiences through which to understand, assume and confront current sociopolitical processes. In working together, actors with various backgrounds and nationalities have shown that a multicultural blend is not only possible but also enriching, as differences lead to new identities, embodiments of dreams, memories, absences and pains that are at once local and universal. Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics