Alma Latina
Half-Venezuelan Tamsin Clarke fell so in-love with the story of Manuelita Saenz, revolutionary, proto-feminist, spy and South American liberator, that she decided to write a show about her. “I went to find her. I travelled for six weeks around Colombia, Ecuador and Peru – following the footsteps she made whilst she was alive and seeing the imprint she left on generations of Latin Americans.” Since performing the one-woman show Manuelita at the Edinburgh Fringe, Tamsin has taken it to theatres around the country. Tamsin trained at the legendary L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris.
One in a Million
When Vicky Araico catapulted us through the first two months of ‘Juana in a Million’ as an illegal Mexican in London, her British audiences didn’t know quite what had hit them. Her storytelling, energy and physicality made the journey of an immigrant so alive and immediate, it won the Fringe First Award at The Edinburgh Festival. Vicky’s one-woman show was inspired by the report ‘No Longer Invisible: The Latin American Community’ in London produced by Queen Mary’s College, University of London. The young actress jumped effortlessly from one character to another, made audiences laugh and cry in equal measure, and showed a glimpse of great things to come – from her and from Latin theatre in the UK.
The Devil and the Macho
David Bedella won an Olivier Award for his portrayal of the devil in ‘Jerry Springer: The Opera’ (and also got publicly applauded by Glenn Close when eating in a restaurant). The award-winning devil – and son of Mexican immigrants from Chicago – ironically moved to London in 2001 when his partner was made vicar of the gay and lesbian Metropolitan Community church in north London. Since then, he’s played plastic surgeon Dr. Carlos Fashola in ‘Holby City’ and many other roles, and is currently playing the macho father, Kevin Rosario in the Tony Award-winning, ‘In The Heights’, for which he won an Olivier Award for best supporting actor.
The Towering Catalans
Human towers, or Castellers, as they are known in Catalan, are an ancient tradition of Catalonia whereby villages often compete to see who can build the tallest human tower. While hefty heavyweights hold the fort at the bottom, small children climb up their fellow Castellers to the very top with astonishing, monkey-like speed. Castellers of London is a group of London-based tower makers, bringing the Catalan tradition to London's boroughs. The world record-holding Castellers has 10 layers of people, so it might take a bit of inter-borough competition to reach the heights of London’s great clock towers!
Manuelita and the Castellers of London will be performing at La Clave Fest tomorrow
See the above artists will be performing at La Clave Fest Tomorrow http://www.latinolife.co.uk/events/clave-fest-crouch-end-festival
