El alma se serena (Soothing the Soul)

Soothing the Soul is a theatre play co-authored by Lluïsa Cunillé y Paco Zarzoso, which the Companyia Hongaresa de Teatre (Hungarian Theatre Company) has put on with growing success since its premiere in 2009.

Three neighbours, a man and two women, sheltered in a building in the Valencian neighbourhood of El Cabanyal, are making life plans while they hear threatening noises coming from the outside. The starting point, as you can see, is reminiscent of The Three Little Pigs by Walt Disney or Key Largo by John Huston, works that also depict the universality of emotional stories about local life. In this case, the invisible enemy is not a ferocious beast (although it is) or a tornado, but a telluric municipal force that seems to be taken out of a comic book. This is Valencia, let’s not forget: the city that invests more on fireworks than on schools and hospitals!

Although the theatre play has numerous representations, the book does not exactly use the images from its staging: Marta Pina, the illustrator, who has invented the tradition of “the illustrated theatre book”, shares her personal perspective while respecting the writing and spirit of the text.

This edition is completed with the three letters Leonardo Perales, a spectator, wrote to the journalist Sergi Tarín communicating his impressions of the play, what the experience had meant to him, and everything that happened afterwards.