Azaña, a Spanish passion. By José Luis Gómez

Based on texts by Manuel Azaña, actor and playwright José Luis Gómez immerses the viewer in a reflection on the history, art and landscape of Spain through a self-portrait of one of the key figures in the historical and political evolution of our country.

Tickets: 20€ and 18€.

"Recital of civil and sacred poetry" (El Mundo).

"An intellectual at war" (El País).

AZAÑA, A SPANISH PASSION

Duration: 60 minutes (approx.)

José Luis Gómez meets again with the man who has accompanied his professional career for years: Manuel Azaña, a key figure in the history of our country. Gómez organizes Azaña's words in three main axes. First, the vital and political circumstance: in the recital, it is outlined by means of a partial self-portrait, some great texts in which Azaña takes pleasure in outlining his public character, the allusions to the government option with the Socialist Party and the military reforms. Secondly, there is the reflection on the history of Spain, the texts chosen here refer to the profound significance of the republican regime, to secularism, to the civil war. Finally, and as the third major axis, there is the meditation on Spanish art and landscape, a meditation that runs through his entire oeuvre and to which we have tried to give due importance. Azaña, una pasión española, first premiered in 1983 at the Centro Dramático Nacional.

ARTISTIC FILE

José Luis Gómez (Huelva, 1940) is an actor, theater director and member of the Royal Spanish Academy. He received the National Theater Award (1988), the Gold Medal of the Círculo de Bellas Artes in 2001 and the Gold Medal for Merit in Fine Arts from the Ministry of Culture in 2005.

Trained at the Institute of Dramatic Art in Westphalia, Germany, and at Jacques Lecoq's school in Paris, he has received numerous awards, including the Cannes Film Festival Award for his performance as lead actor in Ricardo Franco's Pascual Duarte, a role for which he also received a Sant Jordi Film Award and Fotogramas de Plata in the category of best theatrical work for Arturo Ui's La resistible ascensión (Arturo Ui's La resistible ascension). He has been nominated three times for the Goya Awards in the category of best leading actor and has been nominated for the Círculo de Escritores Cinematográficos Medal for his role as a supporting actor in the feature film Todo lo que tú quieras. He has also worked with filmmakers such as Almodóvar, Armiñán, Bollaín, Brassó, Camino, Chávarri, Forman, Gutiérrez Aragón, De la Iglesia, Losey, Miró, Saura and Suárez.

In 1978, he became director of the Centro Dramático Nacional, together with Nuria Espert and Ramón Tamayo, and two years later of the Teatro Español. His most emblematic works of this stage are the stagings of Bodas que fueron famosas del Pingajo y la Fandanga by José María Rodríguez Méndez, which inaugurates the CDN, La velada en Benicarló, original text by Manuel Azaña, as well as La vida es sueño and Absalón by Calderón de la Barca.

Since 1994, he has concentrated on the conception, management and direction of the Teatro de La Abadía, inaugurated in 1995.