Pocahontas

Recensie

"Ongelooflijk knap weet ze de kijker stap voor stap in grote universele thema’s mee te slepen. Consequent zet ze de figuur van Pocahontas in als symbool van het onrecht. Om haar ten slotte opgedoft als vredesduif te laten zingen tussen het slagveld." - Moos van den Broek, De Theaterkrant

Pocahontas as a universal dove of peace

In Pocahontas mime-performance-maker Ariadna Rubio Lleó (known from theatercollective Schwalbe) explores her confused identity with a western sense of guilt and arrogance. Please note that this is not a performance for children.

Dear Pocahontas,

I am going to make a performance in which I play you!

Usually I am cast as a Latina cleaning lady or some exotic whore, because of the way I look, but finally, here’s a wonderful opportunity for me.

I take the Walt Disney’s picture as a reference to work on. You look so beautiful in this movie, a really nice example how to live pure and close to nature. Your John, the cute and muscular Englishman, in which you completely fall for, isn’t wrong either. Jeez, what a guns on that guy! Things don’t come easy for you two in the movie, but I think that you are very brave to face you strict father. A true sign of emancipation. I later read on Wikipedia, that John was actually 40 years old and you were only 12, is that true? Hope not. 

Anyway.. the performance I am going to make, is as well about doing something that actually shouldn’t be allowed. Appropriation, of sorts. But with stories. A bit like we Europeans have done with ‘you people’, right?

Greetings,

Ariadna

About Ariadna Rubio Lléo

Ariadna studied Mime in Amsterdam and graduated in 2008. With her graduation class she co-founded theatercollective Schwalbe. Schwalbe has created different shows that played in The Netherlands and abroad. They won the Theater prize of the BNG bank in 2016 and were nominated for the VSCD Mime prize. Pocahontas will be Ariadna’s first solo project that will be performed in Theater Rotterdam.