José y la Barcelona disidente

From the life of José Tenorio, this show introduces us to the sexual and gender dissidence in Barcelona at the 70s and 80s of the 20th century. A collective memory exercise to reconstruct José’s identity from personal testimonies. Lalinea was a resident company last season, and showed us the process involved in creating its performance, which it premièred at the Grec 2021 Festival in Barcelona. Now it returns to the Lliure.

José Tenorio was not a public figure; he was an anonymous person who, like so many others, took refuge in Barcelona to live life on his own terms. A native of Cadiz, from a very young age he knew he wanted to be a cross-dresser. In 1971, he came to the city to try his luck on stage, even though he was never able to work professionally in theatre. Even though he had good relations with his family, he led a reserved life: he never shared details and his family asked no questions. In 1993, he died of AIDS in his hometown. His real story and the reason for his death were concealed.

Úrsula Tenorio, the director of the company and the grandniece of the main character, wanted to pay tribute to her great-uncle and the lives of people like him who decided to freely express their identity despite the social mores of the era.

Lalinea, the resident company at the Teatre Lliure for the 20/21 season, has undertaken research which is culminating one year later with the premiere of José y la Barcelona disidente. This process was opened to the public with a show of the work in progress, which was framed as a space of dialogue where the artistic and documentary materials that the company had previously collected could be explored in conjunction with the spectators. It was grounded on a historicist point of view to reconstruct the life of José Tenorio via the context of the Barcelona of that period.

Now, we are presenting a show that paints an intimate portrait of José through which we examine the dissidence of the city through the senses.