The House of the Spirits/La Casa de los Espiritus

Winner of the 2011 American Theatre Critics Association Francesca Primus Prize.

A play by Caridad Svich, based on the novel by Isabel Allende

  • Winner of seven 2009 HOLA Awards including Outstanding Achievement in Playwriting.
  • Winner of three 2009 Premios ACE (Latin ACE Award) including Best Dramatic Production
  • Winner of five 2010 Ovation Awards from The Denver Post including Best Production
  • Listed as Number One Theatre Production of 2010 by the Denver Post
  • Listed as Top Five Theatre Productions of 2010 by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune

In Print

“Caridad didn’t try to follow the plot. She recreated the atmosphere and spirit of the book. She has a very original, very special kind of mind. It just goes wild and I admire that. She’s not restricted by anything.” – Isabel Allende*

  • Full-length in four acts. Fluid setting. Cast: 7 women, 4 men.
  • May also be performed with 6 women, 4 men.
  • Original songs in script by Caridad Svich.
  • Text conceived with video and puppetry as essential production components.
  • Script is available in an English-language, Spanish-language and a bilingual version: all written by Caridad Svich.

Synopsis:

“The House of the Spirits,” published in 1982, is a National Bestseller and Isabel Allende’s debut novel which catapulted her to literary stardom. When Isabel Allende’s novel first appeared on the international literary scene, it was widely heralded as a feminist response to Gabriel García Marquez’s “One Hundred Years of Solitude”; it continues to this day to captivate readers across the world as it has been translated in over 20 languages.

Charting the rise and fall of the Trueba family in an un-named Latin American country (reminiscent of Chile), Caridad Svich’s play spans the 1920s through the 1970s, as the country moves through enormous sociopolitical changes that culminate in a devastating dictatorship. The play is told from the sensorial point of view of the youngest of three generation of women, Alba, who is held as the play opens, in a torture room by the government. The swirling memories, frightening and amusing, lyrical and fantastic, illuminate the stage as Alba records her family’s history and ultimately finds the strength to recover her own story. This new re-imagining of “The House of the Spirits” is a bold and daring theatre piece that captures the force and sensuality of Allende’s vision through Caridad Svich’s unique poetic spirit.

 

What People are Saying:

 

Drew Cortese as Esteban Garcia Meghan Wolf as Alba in The House of the Spirits at Denver Center Theatre (2010) directed by Jose Zayas

“Like rain when it’s dry and ice cream in the summer – you can’t say no to the writing of Caridad Svich; you need it, you deserve it. Her mind is generous and nimble; she is capable of subtlety at the highest levels of refinement, and is also inexhaustibly cruel (ice cream is cold as well as sweet) – she is fearless, and will go to every limit in composing an experience. Her talents and perseverance make her a dreamy match for Allende; I can’t imagine a finer adaptor. She has construed a piece that is respectfully literary, while also affirming her own clear voice; the piece is fully theatrical, and Svich does much here to crack the classic problems of the epic on stage – the epic is for her much more than an accumulation of event – it is the risk of the infinite. Here characters and stories continually threaten to spiritualize, yet ultimately remain in their blood. One of our lead writers is writing at the peak of her form. House is a success, a gift.” Erik Ehn, playwright

Publication

English language version (in draft prior to Colorado New Play Summit at Denver Theatre Center) in international theatre journal TheatreForum Issue No. 36, edited by Theodore Shank, Department of Theatre and Dance, University of California-San Diego (ISSN 1060-5320, 2009). (www.theatreforum.org)

Press for The House of Spirits

Feature news articles, radio features and podcasts in the US in English language and Spanish language press:

Reviews of London, England Premiere
Oct 28-November 30, 2019 (extended now until December 14)

Reviews of Gala Hispanic Theatre  (DC)  production:

Reviews of Denver Center Theatre (English-language) production:

Denver Center Theatre Company production press photos:

Reviews of Repertorio Espanol, NYC  (Spanish-language) production:

From the Main Street Theatre, Houston (English language production, (before updated draft):

From the Latin American, Spanish-language premiere at Teatro Mori in Chile (2010):

From the Phoenix, AZ production:

From Costa Rica production:

From Mexico City production:

 Última semana deLa casa de los espíritus, Frente, By Abraham Huitrón,  May 13, 2014

Script History

Script history (in the US):

Originally Commissioned and produced in February 2009 (in Spanish-language) by Repertorio Espanol, NYC under the direction of Jose Zayas with Video Design by Alex Koch, Puppet design by Emily DeCola, Soundscape by David Margolin Lawson,  Choreography by Silvia Sierra, Scenic, Lighting and Costume Design by Robert Federico. (www.repertorio.org)

First English-language production in September 2009 at Main Street Theatre, Houston, Texas under the direction of Rebecca Greene Udden. (www.mainstreettheater.com)

English-language version further developed at the February 2010 Colorado New Play Summit at Denver Theatre Center.

Premiere of revised English-language production in September 2010 at Denver Theatre Center in Denver, CO under the direction of Jose Zayas. (www.dcpa.org)

Premiere of bilingual version in October 2010 at Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis, MN under the direction of Marcela Lorca with musical score by Victor Zupanc. (www.mixedblood.com)

Script history abroad:

Latin American premiere in June 2010 (in Spanish) at Teatro Mori Parque Arauco, Santiago, Chile with a pre-premiere in Humberstone, Chile, produced by Ana Maria Palma and AMPY Producciones, Compania Teatro de Camara, Cia Minera Dona Ines de Collahuasi, Corporacion Patrimonio Cultural de Chile and the US Embassy in Chile under the direction of Jose Zayas with video design by Alex Koch. Cast: Francisco Melo, Blanca Lewin, Ana Maria Palma, Coca Guazzini, Julio Jung, Loreto Valenzuela, Daniela Lhorente, Gabriela Medina, Josefina Velasco, Jose Palma, Julio Jung Duvauchelle, Catalina Palma.

This Teatro Mori Parque Arauco is scheduled for a return engagement in January 2011 as part of the Santiago a Mil Festival, Chile.

Trailer for Costa Rica production

Video interview for Costa Rica production

Sneak Peek of Webster Conservatory Production

trailer for the Mexico production

2 min excerpt from the DC production at Gala Hispanic Theatre

From Mixed Blood production

What People Have Said

Selected critical and industry responses:

“Playwright Caridad Svich, working in uncommon unity with director Jose Zayas and a top creative team, makes what’s vivid on the page a starburst on the stage. Their efforts not only make the most harrowing aspects of Allende’s tale more palatable for us to watch, they help achieve a near-perfect balance of violence and visual poetry.” — John Moore, The Denver Post

“The power of Caridad Svich’s take on Isabel Allende’s celebrated novel lies in the accumulation of images, actions and passionate words that the play pours out into the audience, as well as the bitter sadness at its heart. … Svich and Allende link the personal and the political and show individual actions reaching forward through time, whether to damn or to save.” –Juliet Wittman, Westword

“Allende’s epic novel bursts forth in the circular Space Theatre of DCTC… Caridad Svich’s script delivers a series of relevant commentaries on the haves and have nots.” –Bob Bows, Variety (2010)

“This new adaptation is lean, stripped of subplots at just over half that length in the original Spanish. The context in which the novel was written, in exile from the Pinochet dictatorship that had killed Isabel’s uncle, Salvador Allende, is front and center in the form of Clara’s granddaughter Alba, who is raped in prison for supporting the socialist party. She never leaves the stage and frequently interacts with her ancestors, implicitly making the point that the military regime cannot be viewed in isolation from centuries of class warfare. So, the magic in this version is more than a diversion, it is an escape from reality. By making innovative use of video the play brings Clara’s diaries to life. A spectral hand writing across the set, when an earthquake strikes, a line drawing of the house shakes violently on an overhead projector. It’s surprisingly effective.” Andrew Purcell, BBC Radio (The Strand)

“A tumultuous and supernatural family saga that restores the story’s vibrant magical realism. Svich, who also wrote the play’s pretty songs, effectively condenses the saga.” Anita Gates, The New York Times

“[Critic’s Pick] Symbolism and magic realism take a back seat to human drama in Caridad Svich’s lyrical and satisfying adaptation of Allende’s novel. A movingly epic family drama.” Andy Propst, Backstage.com

“In unfolding the story as Alba’s flashback, Svich effectively nails the book’s central drama: the way Allende interrogates her family’s – and, by extension, Chile’s – bloody history through the brutal moral logic of Esteban Trueba’s eventful life. The story swells in urgency, and relevance.” Rob Weinert-Kendt, The Village Voice

“La Casa De Los Espiritus/The House of the Spirits was one of the most powerful productions I saw in New York this past year. On every level. The writing by Caridad Svich was exquisite. I never felt that I was watching an “adaptation”. It was pure theater, a story which felt like it could only exist on stage. The direction by Jose Zayas was both highly imaginative and emotionally “real”. In fact, it was one of those rare experiences in the theater where you felt that the collaboration between director, designers, actors, and writer was just…perfect for the piece. It was my first experience at Repertorio Espanol in many years and, if this is an example of the work they do, I want to see more.” Lisa Loomer, Playwright

“Like rain when it’s dry and ice cream in the summer – you can’t say no to the writing of Caridad Svich; you need it, you deserve it. Her mind is generous and nimble; she is capable of subtlety at the highest levels of refinement, and is also inexhaustibly cruel (ice cream is cold as well as sweet) – she is fearless, and will go to every limit in composing an experience. Her talents and perseverance make her a dreamy match for Allende; I can’t imagine a finer adaptor. She has construed a piece that is respectfully literary, while also affirming her own clear voice; the piece is fully theatrical, and Svich does much here to crack the classic problems of the epic on stage – the epic is for her much more than an accumulation of event – it is the risk of the infinite. Here characters and stories continually threaten to spiritualize, yet ultimately remain in their blood. One of our lead writers is writing at the peak of her form. House is a success, a gift.” Erik Ehn, playwright

“In the House of the Spirits, Svich has an almost uncanny ability to find the most resonant balance between the multiple layers of a story and a compact time frame. Her cross-cultural awareness and her fearlessness in the face of complicated interactions, both political and personal, put her at the forefront of important, new theatrical works. Whenever you come across Svich’s work for the theater, brace yourselves for a truly original and moving experience.” Naomi Wallace, playwright