Vol. xxviii #4

December, 2007

-- Peter Gould

I look out the airplane window at the propeller shedding raindrops. It's the third time I've arrived in Central America on the first day of rainy season. I look down and see a few twinkling city lights next to a vast dark area - mountains, fields of sugar cane, banana plantations. The plane touches down and I walk across the wet tarmac of San Pedro Sula International Airport. The last time I was here, Honduras looked and felt like an armed camp to me. I came then as a Spanish-speaking theatre performer from Vermont, an arts ambassador, and a playwright who wrote to help North Americans understand the "civil war" in El Salvador. That was a long time ago.

The customs inspectors are friendly. They are interested in my suitcase full of juggling balls, silk scarves, Hawaiian shirts and silly pants. But it's the big red plastic hammer that causes the most commotion. When I'm finally admitted to the country, and my son Willie Gould embraces me, I answer his anxious "Dad, what took you so long?" with a blow-by-blow account of just how many terminal employees had requested, and received, a whack on the head with my much-traveled clown hammer.

Esteban Canales, fine young actor and steady driver, navigates the old la fragua van east toward Progreso. Willie has been an intern with the company for two months. He tells me about sharing his juggling skills with the troupe, about touring with them as Tampico the gringo clown, about directing an all-new show - "Más Aventuras de Tío Coyote y Tío Conejo" - which will soon become part of the traveling repertory. I look out at the dark wet highway, then at the shining new maquiladoras where night shift workers are turning out T-shirts and baseball caps, and then at the harsh pink Dunkin' Donuts, KFC, and Popeyes that mark the entrance into town.

The watchman opens the gate for us, and we bump across the rectory's muddy driveway. Jack Warner is waiting. We head out for a late-night meal of salty delicious thin grilled steaks and fried bananas. A permanent awning keeps the rain at bay. We talk theatre, clowning, politics, history, global economics, drug trafficking, climate change. I'm blessed by the undimmed sparkle in Jack's eyes as we talk, and the years since I have been here fall away.

For the next five days I fall in love all over again with this particular corner of Honduras. It's still as hot as ever, but the old banana plantation life has given way to a hodge-podge of store fronts and curbside stalls hawking cell phones, computers, all-natural juices, fried chicken, living room furniture, English classes, redemption, x-rays, contact lenses, and the best baleadas (that's Honduran for empanadas) anywhere in the Américas.

I ride by it all on a loaner bicycle, cross the old divided highway, and turn down where the United Fruit Company country club and guest houses used to be. I see the grove of tall palm trees sheltering the teatro compound. Under the shade, in the slightly cooler building, the troupe rehearses with Willie, and I sit in Jack's office discussing ideas for a Masters Program in Theatre for Social Change that I hope to offer soon in Vermont. I could search the wide world over, and not find a better source - for the right books to read, the right people to contact in Europe and South America, and for personal stories of how la fragua has forged its identity and struggled on for so many years.

In this changed country of state-of-the-art textile factories, gang violence, drug running, absent fathers, and a middle class in perpetual financial pain, teatro la fragua keeps on keeping on. Young people in fresh school uniforms fill the seats, with parents who attended the old gospel stories that the troupe started acting in the 80's. They all laugh and clap and whistle, and they listen. Real live theatre builds community. And it serves as an antidote to television, with its isolation, non-stop commercial messages, and frequently-negative images of women and working people. And the Cuentos Hondureños keep alive a folk tradition that is humble, close to home, and close to nature.

As the weekend approaches, I'm out of the back office and on to the stage, rehearsing. I've come to El Progreso to perform. For two days I gather props, practice clown-jumping off a tall step ladder, and rehearse juggling routines and songs with Willie. Posters for our show appear on utility poles all around town. Tampico y su padre, the gringo clown and his dad.

On Saturday night, Walter dims the house lights and Willie waits behind the bleachers for his entrance. In the spotlight, Padre Jack introduces me first. I lurch out of my hiding place in the audience with my red nose, floppy hat, crazy tie, and Hawaiian shirt. I leap on to the lap of a woman in row two who is whispering into her cell phone. I pop her with my red plastic hammer, grab her phone, whoever she's talking to gets a lecture from my spanish-speaking kazoo, and I am, incontestably, back on the teatro la fragua stage after an absence of twenty years.

Playing with my son on a hot tropical night on a stage with such righteous history - two ridiculous clowns far from home, in our duet show De Tal Palo, Tal Astilla ("Like Father, Like Son") - I feel about as happy as I can be.

The next morning it's Jack's turn to perform. Not a clown show, but a simple folk tale with a universal message. Not a stage, but an altar: where theatre began. In the church that faces El Progreso's central square, Jack tells about the miracle of the loaves and fishes. He looks out on his audience gathered on their benches. Willie and I are among them.

Jack says, I like to think it wasn't a real miracle. It's just that the apostles saw five thousand people gathered at dinner time, and it made them feel afraid and hungry, guarding what little food they had. They said, how can we ever feed them all?

"Start sharing the little we have," Jesus said, "and watch what happens." So, reluctantly, they parceled out their bread and fish, and - here's the miracle - someone in the crowd handed over an onion, someone else a soup-bone, someone else a turnip. And when all the sharing was done, the great stew fed everyone.

Jack tells the audience, "This country, Honduras, has enough resources for everyone. We just have to learn to share them a little better." Willie and I look around and see nods of understanding all around us.

It's messages like this that teatro la fragua carries all over Honduras, and sometimes to other parts of the world, in a language of physical comedy that anyone anywhere can understand. They roll into town in an old van loaded with laughter, justice, truth, and simple folk-based messages of sharing. la fragua is not a miracle, but it is unique in the world. In this season of holiday generosity, please remember us with a contribution!

[Dr. Peter Gould, Ph.D., is a theatrical veteran of thousands of shows and hundreds of workshops, residencies and conferences for students of all ages. He lives in Brattleboro, Vermont.]