A contemporary clown and master of multi-lingual stand-up performance, Agnés Mateus (with co-writer Quim Tarrida behind the curtains) has a preternatural ability to grasp the nettle hidden in things and make the spectator think while laughing about it. If King Lear had had Mateus as clown instead of that other guy, Cordelia would be as popular and cheerful a first name as Catherine.
The last time I saw Mateus on stage she was doing woman-murder – Rebota rebota y en tu cara explota. Even if it doesn’t appear in most school curriculum, woman-murder is a rather well-known (at least among women) as well as a popular, if under-reported, blood sport. Mateus’ piece around woman-murder leaves a body not so much aghast as thoughtful: in the end, it’s pretty clear that it is one of those things that are quite deliberately constructed out of social perception, not, like so many other things, merely ignored.
And afterward, over wine, in the days that follow, the effect of Mateus’ way of clowning out a subject leaves a body even more thoughtful: little, apparently unconnected things, such as that overcrowded and inadequate women’s toilets may be the norm because, like certain consequences of man-woman relations, certain aspects of female-need is just constructed out of architecture.
For Patatas frites falsas (“Fake fries”), Mateus’ shtick is “Francoism”. A body understands Francoism as “fascism”, a word whose use is currently disputed and frowned upon. Maybe she’s avoiding it because the controversy makes it unfunny. But more likely is that the fascist varietal she calls “Francoism” is more stageable, even for the historically ignorant.
Apart from the trick of making a body laugh while confronting un-loveable fact, what Rebota rebota and Patatas falsasshare is the capacity to open out on the whole tableau of the unloveable thing in question, so that a body walks away from the show not so much aghast as thoughtful.
So, I walked out of Patatas falsas feeling my feelings, yes, but also thinking that I should pay more attention to the state of mind that is fascism – fascism as an integral part of a socially-shared reality editor, a shared psychology, a shared social construct. In other words, fascism is definitely not just a political phenomenon, it’s an avatar of how we construct ourselves to experience the world around.
As a political phenomenon, Spain’s fascism varietal, is forever associated with the dour little leader Francisco Franco. Franco’s political organ was Falange Española Tradicionalista y de las Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional Sindicalista, whose slogan was “Spain first”. The words suggest tradition, aggressive national unity and a certain programmatic vacuity, while the length evokes the time – 40 years! – this organ, Franco and Francoism imposed themselves on Spain. It all died with a whimper in 1975.
Throughout Patatas falsas, there’s a lot of running around, dramatic tension, bathing and projecting and spotting light, sound. But out this stagecraft and comic relief, two things seemed to me operative: lengthy vacuity and schizophrenia, contradictory doubleness.
For spectators, Patatas fritas falsas opens with a long, silent stare from the dark at the stage curtain. The curtain is a gigantic Franco-era-flag of Spain. It differs from Spain’s current flag in that a large, Teutonic-looking eagle seems to b--g-r some royal-looking arms. A body stares for what seems ages at this damned flag until is opens, segues, flag into stage of household appurtenances and a washing machine, a Mateus as female clown playing herself in different ways: as a more or less muttering, fuming and fizzing Bladder of Complaint, as the Bladder’s Tolerant Self as invoker, manipulator and interlocutor of the ghost of Franco as a dapper hand puppet, and, finally, as a vaguely insulting black angel that hands out conditional favors.
This spectator walks away from Patatas falsas with this idea of how the contemporary unmentionables of Francoism mainly work.
First, there’s The Wait, as before the Franco flag. The Wait is the ruling principle of fascism, as it is in the military, where the slogan is “hurry up and wait” (and just as it is in drama, come to think of it – where The Wait induces surprise and “suspension of disbelief” or, more simply, a coming event!).If a body has ever had a bad boss, they will instinctually recognize, especially, The Wait.
The Wait, like Shiva, has three qualities: 1. indeterminate duration, because hurry up, be prepared, be ready – compulsive obsession – are the watchwords; 2. Cooling of the heels, partner, because a leader is the leader and wasting your time is The Leader’s Acknowledged Prerogative; 3. nervous expectation, because the next unexpected, indeterminate move is the very name of The Leader: exhausting enough to demoralize or paralyze all involved.
Within The Wait, “paranoid-schizophrenia” – the antagonized doubled aspect of character or personality or role – is the dominant psychic organization. In fact, the whole interest of the piece’s solo stand-up format seems to me to lay in the entanglement of the double points of view of paranoid schizophrenia.
In Patatas falsas, the main dramatic doubling takes form as poor temper and reproof or victimization and moralization or sin and virtue within the comic Bladder of Complaint and the virtuous Tolerant Self entanglement. Diffuse dissatisfaction followed by moralizing reproof cycles along until, beside itself, the clown divides into two distinct, antagonistic views in a single skin: Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Hyde (or Jekyll) is both in denial of the embarrassingly uncharitable Jekyll’s (Hyde’s) fuming and fizzing and made angry and fearful by Hyde’s (or Jekyll’s) ’s sinful self-regard and selfishness. The harmonization of the antagonists (and the performance) ends with this hoarse whimper
ich Hab’ angst, ich bin deine angst. (I am afraid, I am your fear!)
And here’s what Agnès Mateus has me thinking after the performance, over my wine. The schizophrenia may be more consequential than fascism.
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I saw “Patatas fritas falsas” (“Fake fries”), written and directed by Agnés Mateus and Quim Tarrida, performed by Agnès Mateus on 10 January 2025 at Théatre de la Bastille.
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