During Argentina’s rightwing dictatorship, which lasted from 1976 to 1983, thousands of people disappeared, murdered by the military. Women who were repeatedly raped and gave birth while in detention had their babies taken from them to be brought up by families loyal to the military. In the decades since, the mothers and the grandmothers of the disappeared have kept their memory alive.
This show takes a novel approach by turning the tale of Ana (Charlotte Worthing), who disappears while on a student protest against the cost of bus fares, into a musical cabaret. It’s set in the seedy Coup Coup club where the General (Rob Castell) and his henchmen (Neil Kelso and Alexander Luttley) are magicians who can indeed make people disappear and whose torture looks very much like the old music hall trick of sawing a lady in half.
The music, by Darren Clark, is richly infused with South American rhythms and a complete delight; the lyrics are sharp, too. A brilliant second act number, The School of Americas, delivered by Rosalind Ford’s CIA agent doing a stars-and-stripes strip show, makes the US’s support of the murderous regime clear.
Neatly designed by Georgia Lowe and Alex Berry, the space oozes tawdry atmosphere, and the show cleverly compares the smoke and mirrors of dictatorship to the illusions of hypnotists and magicians. Just as an audience allow themselves to be deceived by stage performers, the piece suggests that citizens too easily allowed themselves to be bamboozled by the junta.
Director Amy Draper also doesn’t quite manage the shift in tone as the story darkens and the evening turns awkwardly into a piece in which fact, including verbatim testimony, sits uneasily amid the fiction of the theatre. It is heartfelt but a little too earnest. Nevertheless, it’s a musically rousing evening – with a class band – and never loses sight of how important it is to be alert to the trickery of politicians.
• At the Arcola, London, until 15 July. Box office: 020-7503 1646.
