ACTORS is a collective creation that reflects on the actor’s work in its many forms of expression. A performance based on autobiographical statements – in a diaristic tone – about each of its performers’ professional experience and their relation with texts they performed over the years, an association of fragmented narratives, going from the great classics to soap opera scripts, radio or television commercials. Altogether, over 40 texts by different authors, representing a parallel dramaturgy and a retrospective gaze on the life of each actor.

“During rehearsal periods of the previous shows I directed, I often watched actors, whether in their dressing rooms or lunch breaks, memorising “lines” for soap operas or television series, using their little time of rest to work on other texts. I remember finding it a bit disconcerting – it bothered me, it made me feel slightly jealous because they weren’t concentrating exclusively on our work, on the show we were putting together, they were dispersing energy and consequently wasting their resources on a “second job”, and that seemed to me completely empty and superfluous.

Over time, I learned to respect those “betrayals” and to perceive them as inevitable. I openly discussed with the actors about their needs, and the need to embrace “the other jobs”. Then, I became myself curious of the lines they were working on at lunchtime. And so came up the idea of doing a show that would talk precisely about that and an urge to put “ACTORS” together was born.”

Marco Martins