‘When he sleeps with me’, I find surprise in the waiting room of a hospital

Laura and Vicente are one night in the waiting room of a hospital. She has her husband, with whom she has been married for 20 years, in the ICU; He to the love of his life, with whom he joins a nine -year relationship. But soon they discover that they have something that unites them …

This is the argument of ‘When he sleeps with me‘, a work written and directed by the Argentine Eduardo Románwhich arrives in Spain a decade and several awards after after its international premiere, and is presented in an unusual scenario: room 3 of the Capitol Theaterin full Gran Vía Madrid, from April 4 to June 29 (Friday to Sunday). His interpreters are Elena Ballesteros and Jorge Pobes.

«I started reading the text and I could not stop,” says Elena Ballesteros; And at the end I cried … I cried, laughed, gave me anger … I lived absolutely all the processes of the two characters. So I decided to embark on the project; I knew it was going to be hard work, it has been and is being, but I am deeply in love with the project and it is worth it.

Jorge Pobes had a sensation similar to that of his cast partner. «The story of these two characters caught me and the way of facing her. He caught and ended up crying too, he moved me. It is a text ‘really’, in which two characters undress their soul in one night, in intimacy, at a critical moment, waiting because a relative has had an accident. They go through a lot of situations, there are no turns, changes … It goes from laughter to crying, from dialogue to discussion … They go through a lot of emotional states, and this as an actor seems to me a fantastic challenge. «The situation,” says Elena Ballesteros, “gives rise to that. When one is facing face with death he opens his soul in another way ».

From the truth

The actress defines the two characters: «She is a super hermetic woman, she is very clear about what she has to do in her life and is Very controlling; Vicente, meanwhile, is a sensitive person, more connected with emotionand manages to drag that more communication from soul to soul, from people.

“The truth is not absolute, but each one has its truth,” Eduardo Román interves. And the characters are written and developed From the truthwhich becomes community, in truths of many people; The love link, routine, marriage, children, are issues that we all know. And what happens to the loss of one of them? Laura and Vicente explore the possibility of being alone ».

«To what extent are you in love with that person? -Interumpe Elena Ballesteros- Have you told you or haven’t you told him? Or if it is simply comfort or fear of loneliness? In that situation you consider many things that you do not do it on a day to day, you still throw out inertia ». “The day to day is taking us all,” Jorge Pobes intervenes. It seems that you have everything very structured and do not stop to think how you are. That is why there is so much importance today to psychology, right? To someone arrive, put you in your place and tell you: how are you? “

Psychologist

The author and director follows: «Vicente acts a bit of Laura psychologist at certain times. They are antagonistic people, yours are two very different realities; They face the same problem and each one solves it from the place you can. He from a tranquility and amazing serenity for a controlling woman and she since … is not hysteria, but it is the anxiety of knowing vulnerable. And the attractiveness is to connect from opposite places ».

The tense situation makes it necessary to open a It spits to humor. “It gives rise to comedy,” says Elena Ballesteros. They are situations … well, her mother … There are many things, comments at a certain moment that make the tension loosen a little, and it is necessary. Too much tension a long time ».

Elena Ballesteros and Jorge Pobes agreed on the stage playing Ana Ozores and Fermín de Pas in ‘La Regenta’, a montage based on Clarín’s novel; And they made lovers in ‘One less life in the Canary Islands’, “we didn’t share any scene,” the actress says, “but we saw each other and had many conversations in the halls.”

Fingerprint

A work like ‘When he sleeps with me‘He necessarily has to leave a mark on the actors. “I have to be honest,” says Elena Ballesteros. I am at a point where I really don’t differentiate. My husband, who is like my thermometer, tells me before phrases that I say or gestures that I do: ‘It’s not you, it’s Laura’. It happens to me often; but it is inevitable until everything sits and differences totally between the character and the person ».

«I think it is very soon to see the footprint that Laura and Vicente have left us personally. It has been a month too dense; Very nice, a brutal processbut it is true that it has been very dense. I am not yet aware of what has happened these last four weeks. In addition, I had a baby and in my life lately everything is up. You have to settle the work. What I can say is that they are characters that remove a lot inside ».