the audience at the Adrar Theatre, as part of the second edition of the Saharan Theatre Nights Festival, witnessed a theatrical performance titled “A Scream in the Dark” presented by the Brazilian company “Compañía Nova de Teatro” on Tuesday evening.
Directed by Lenerson Polonini, the performance delved into the darkest and bloodiest period in Brazilian history, from 1964 to 1985, using multimedia to evoke that historical era and reflect the mechanisms of military dictatorship and censorship in Brazil.
The performance employed multimedia theatrical techniques and included several scenes, among them a documentary segment highlighting the suffering of a number of women who endured psychological and physical pain during the war.
These scenes told the stories of women subjected to unimaginable injustice and violence. The aim was to silence dissent and impose censorship on everyone in the aftermath of the 1964 military coup.
Torture scenes, including electric shocks and painful upside-down suspension, were among the forms of torture practiced by the regime, along with sexual and physical assault and the administration of hallucinogenic drugs that caused amnesia.
This totalitarian regime used violence in various forms against anyone who opposed its ideology.
As a result, the press was severely restricted and censored to prevent the truth from emerging, perpetuating the era of darkness.
“A totalitarian regime knows no bounds, and the state is a war machine that destroys everything and everyone,” the director asserted, exploring this situation theatrically through a single actress, Carina Casuscelli, who portrayed several roles.
The play shed light on a part of Brazil’s collective memory, offering a close look at the women who were arrested and tortured under this regime.
The Algerian audience reacted strongly to many scenes in the performance, having lived through a unique period of repression and torture under French occupation, a time when voices were silenced and the Algerian people were subjected to all forms of abuse.
They also suffered through the dark decade of the 1990s, a time of unjust killings, when artists, teachers, and innocent citizens were brutally murdered in the name of Islamophobia, a phenomenon entirely alien to the religion.
Theater has always been a form of resistance, especially as the second edition of the Desert Nights Theater Festival in Adrar carried the theme “Theater… Resistance.” The play “A Cry in the Darkness” tells the stories of women who resisted for democracy in Brazil and later suffered under the oppressive regime that claimed the lives of many activists.
Sarah Bouayad