"A timely slap", Marta Buchaca talks about current education

A psychomotor skills room. A grandfather, a grandmother, a father, and a mother. The director has called them because an 8-year-old boy, Roc, has said something very serious. This is how Una bufetada a temps begins. A comedy by Marta Buchaca that delves into children's education… into what was done before, into what is done now. And she does it without judging… a very difficult balance that she manages to maintain throughout the play.

What happens in this psychomotor skills room is more than a meeting between Roger and Gemma, Roc's parents, Ramon and Fina, the grandparents, and the director Riu. It is a catharsis.

Una bufetada a temps, a very complete comedy

The four performers, Ramon Madaula (grandfather Ramon), Montse Guallar (grandmother Fina), Marc Rius (Roger), Eudald Font (Riu) and Sara Diego (Gemma), very well directed by Marta Buchaca, say much more than the text says. In this production, it's not just what is said, it's also what is seen: non-verbal communication, gestures, faces, the intonation with which each thing is said… the movements on stage… It's a whole that makes Una bufetada a temps a complete comedy that makes you laugh a lot.

But it doesn't just make you laugh a lot. It also makes you think a lot. Because education is a topic always present in our lives (and lately, it seems omnipresent!). What do we want our children to learn? How do we want them to learn? What education do we want to give them? What kind of role model do we want to be?

A text that does not take a stance so that the audience can take a stance

The audience does decide what Marta Buchaca's text does not. The text does not take a stance on any type of education. But the audience (very heterogeneous) enthusiastically applauded grandfather Ramon's interventions while heartily laughing at Riu, the director's, interventions. Is it a symptom? Or perhaps it only happened on the day we went?

When you go, and you must go, you decide what you want. What education do you want for your children? Marta Buchaca's text will give you many ideas and make you ask yourselves many questions.

Performers who make the text soar

But a text like this needs performers who make it soar. And Marta Buchaca has found them:

• Ramon Madaula is a lovable grandfather. A close grandfather. A grandfather we all know.
• Montse Guallar is Grandma Fina, that conciliatory grandmother, who tries to always ensure understanding. And also, we all know one.
• Marc Rius is Roger, a man committed to an idea of family and education. A man who gives everything to fulfill what he believes in.
• Sara Diego is Gemma, the mother who wants to do everything well, who is afraid of making mistakes. Who defends her idea of education tooth and nail because she cannot conceive that, perhaps, she might be wrong.
• Eudald Font is Riu, the director of a school with values and a system that have almost become a dogma of faith. What he will experience in this meeting will make him realize that one must be more flexible.

It is a very good comedy that dares to tackle a hot and always current topic: education.

Roger and Gemma want to be good parents

They don't want to do the same thing their parents did to them. They want to escape the model of education they received. And, what they achieve is that their parents' model is the one they have as a point of reference... to move away from it, but it is the starting point. Roger wants to be the close father he didn't have. Gemma wants to be the mother who was never there... when it came down to it... neither of them succeeds.

Una bufetada a temps, at La Villarroel, is a very good comedy that dares to tackle a hot and always current topic: education. A topic treated with humor that provides a lot of material to talk about for many hours. A comedy that needs to be seen more than once to grasp everything that is said... because it is a comedy, but it is not at all superficial.

Una bufetada a temps will make you laugh a lot. And, best of all, you will end up laughing at yourselves. And that is very healthy!