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Painting history with flying colors

By Lisa Bornstein, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published March 7, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

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A messenger (Jose Guerrero) reports to Montezuma (Bobby LeFebre) in Ollin.

Photo by El Centro Su Teatro

A messenger (Jose Guerrero) reports to Montezuma (Bobby LeFebre) in Ollin.

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In composer Daniel Valdez's third collaboration with the company, El Centro Su Teatro has come up with a performance piece that sacrifices neither the company's community and political origins nor artistic achievement.

Written and directed by Valdez, a major figure in the history of Chicano theater and film, Ollin depicts the arrival of the Spanish on Aztec land and the eventual demise of Aztec sovereignty. The story is interwoven with bilingual music and primarily Aztec dance, with a result that's stirring and visually involving.

A four-piece band, consisting of woodwinds, drums, guitar and bass, fills the tiny theater (without overpowering the voices - how nice to hear performers not dependent on microphones) as the nearly empty set (a painted floor and the suggestion of a pyramid) fills with the vibrant costumes of Valarie Castillo. It's hard not to side with the Aztecs when the blacks and whites of the Spaniards are overtaking such fiercely colored, feathered headdresses and anklets punctuated with bells.

Valdez's music is beautifully written here, and musical director Tony Silva pulls together a cast in strong voice, particularly aided by the soulful Felicia Gallegos Pettis. Grupo Tlaloc has influenced the percussive Aztec dance, exemplified by Anthony Saiz as the god Quetzalcoatl. As Hernan Cortes, Jesse Ogas cuts an imposing figure, but his acting is too much pronouncing and too little being.

Pettis plays Malinitzin, the Aztec woman given to Cortes, and she offers a strong, smart interpreter whose willingness to mother the first mestizos is unclear. Valarie Castillo and Lara Gallegos convey us through the story as Aztec muses.

Ollin is beautifully done, but it's only an hour long. It would make a terrific candidate for restaging in the new Su Teatro space. Most interesting would be its juxtaposition with another one-act, one that shows contemporary Mexico in contrast.

Ollin

* Grade: B+

* When and where: 8:05 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays through March 29, El Centro Su Teatro, 4725 High St.

* Cost: $15 to $18

* Information: 303-296-0219