Quiltro-Art by Tyra Hayward

Yasmine Agocs’ Quiltro, being presented by Basil Page Productions at Soulpepper as part of the Fringe is rather more than it seems.  Here’s the blurb:

“What would you do if you could experience the memories of your ancestors?  Following her parents’ divorce, 13-year-old Nina runs away to join a group of stray dogs in her town. On her journey of self-actualization and acceptance, the looming, ominous presence of a dangerous cryptic creature stalks her, preying on the fear within her deep, dark memories.”

But what we get is the story you see above mixed in with family stories of what happened in Chile before, during and after the Pinochet coup cut with excerpts from Allende’s final speech (in Spanish).  Cheyla McNally Rondon plays 13 year old Nina who is running away.  Alejandra Angobaldo plays everybody else. Among them are the “hombre”; a Chilean refugee in Canada who has “dropped out”, “Little Shit”; the terrifying creature who destroyed Nina’s grandmother’s farm and now seems to be lurking in the woods wherever we are and with which/whom Nina has a terrifying confrontation, and (I think) another aspect of Nina’s character; perhaps the rational side rather than the more idealistic romantic persona portrayed by Rondon.

How are we to read it?  I think we are seeing Chile’s trauma through the eyes of someone a generation or two removed from the events of 1973.  Their POV is “fuzzier” than people who were there or maybe even the stories that their contemporaries (like me) heard from them in exile.  After all, we don’t tell our children “the whole truth”.  Maybe “Little Shit” represents the Pinochet dictatorship in all its terror but also its brittle, essentially fragile nature; a creature of American Fascism that never really had its own life force but fed on the blood of others.  All of this is wrapped in the sort of “Magic Real;ism” one expects from a Latin American work.

It’s very well constructed and the acting is excellent.  It’s dark, it’s powerful but it’s ultimately hopeful.

“Workers of my country.  I have faith in Chile and in her destiny.  Other men will overcome this grey and bitter moment where treason tries to impose itself.  May you continue to know that much sooner than later the great avenues through which free men will pass to build a better society will open.  Long live Chile.  Long live the People.  Long live the Workers.”