Review of "The Grönholm Method"

Author: Jordi Galcerán. Director: Tamzin Townsend. Interpreters: Luis Merlo, Vicente Romero, Jorge Bosch and Marta Belenguer. Cofidis Alcazar Theater, Madrid. Until June 28.

The "The Grönholm method" is unparalleled in the history of our recent theater. Probably very few people remain, not to mention that there is no one left, who has not yet seen this play by Jordi Galcerán or, failing that, the distorted film version, also very popular, that Marcelo Piñeyro made of it. Converted into a modern classic on its own merits after its first premiere in 2004, the work, however visible it may be, continues to drag the public in mass to the halls. And that is what is happening at the Cofidis Alcazar Theater; or, at least, it is what can be inferred attending to the magnificent entrance that the function presented when a server could see it, which was one day in the middle of the week and away already in the time of the customary fervor of the first representations. An important claim to repeat the original success is sure to have, as in the first assembly, with Tamzin Townsend as director. And it is not the only one that repeats: the actor Jordi Bosch returns to meet the same character that was holstered years ago, accompanied this time on stage by Luis Merlo, Marta Belenguer and Vicente Romero.

Galcerán's acid look at the meanness of the human being when he is forced to fight with others to get a job, and also, of course, to the vileness of those who provoke and favor that fight trying to find the right candidate, It remains as deep and vigorous as it was years ago. But the most difficult, original and intelligent part of the work is that the author - who knows how few can catch the attention of the viewer and what is not - was able to express his overwhelming criticism, combining with great accuracy the plot precision and the rhythm of the thriller with the elements of the purest comedy. A comedy, everything must be said, that precisely because of wanting to extreme it in the interpretations, and in the direction of the same, it sometimes falters in this new assembly. It was not necessary to emphasize in the scenic language, as has been done, the nature of some characters who, on the text, already presented the fair doses of cynicism and pathos they needed in line with the plot. Nor was it necessary to sweeten the end - I understand that this will have been something of Galcerán himself, because no “adapter” appears in the credits - with a new twist that could culminate, although it is not entirely clear, in a kind of poetic justice that undermines the beautiful satirical grounds that the first version had.