Rudolfo Anaya's "Rosa Linda"

Mario Moreno, Ashley Weingardt, and Carmela Roybal in Rudolfo Anaya's "Rosa Linda," a co-production of the National Hispanic Cultural Center and the Vortex Theatre, Albuquerque, NM, April 19-21, 2013

Rudolfo Anaya is a New Mexico institution and one of the premiere Chicano literary lights in the country; I think the term used to describe him and his works is "beloved" -- when he's not being honored as "El Maestro." He's a delightful elder quite apart from his literary works, and I don't doubt that's part of his staying power. His continuing creative output is a testament to his endurance as well as his literary talent and skill.

The world premiere of his new play, "Rosa Linda" opened last Friday at the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, and we saw it this afternoon.

This was, of course, something of a special event for us as in a previous life I was producing director at a theater I co-founded in California which specialized in the premieres of new works by women and people of color. We never did a Rudolfo Anaya work, but we were certainly familiar with him and his oeuvre, and since we've moved to New Mexico, we've had a chance to meet him and get to know more of his work.

Anaya was born in Pastura, NM, but raised in Santa Rosa. Though he has a highly developed rural New Mexico sensitivity and sensibility, he's not really a country boy, and at least to my mind, he seems to know it. Santa Rosa is not a big town by any means, but it's nothing like Pastura -- which is little more than a couple of streets by the Santa Fe railroad tracks hosting a handful of tin-roofed tumble down buildings. Santa Rosa's a big city by comparison.

Santa Rosa is on the edge of the Llano Escatado  -- the Palisaded Plains -- that's mostly in Texas. It's ranch and cattle country, not unlike the area in New Mexico where we've settled, though its elevation isn't nearly as high. The landscape can be varied.

"Rosa Linda" is set somewhere near the llano and Santa Rosa in 1900 when change was the order of the day in New Mexico, as the Anglos consolidated their political power and economic control -- in part by dispossessing the Hispanic landowners. The land rights story here is, if anything, more fraughtful than that of California.

The play is set on the Augustin's rural ranch, and the action takes place both at the ranch house and at the river -- one assumes it's the Pecos -- where "Los Turcos" are encamped. My only previous encounter with "Turcos" in the context of a Spanish language entertainment was a character called "El Turco" -- a Syrian tradesman -- in a Columbian telenovela. Turns out in Rudolfo's conception, the Turcos are Mexican Gypsies who have been allowed to stay on the ranch and trade with the locals and provide entertainment from time to time for many years.

The story of "Rosa Linda" can be characterized as a more or less standard Hispanic story of "amor prohibido" one of the biggest drivers of Spanish story-telling for hundreds of years. In this case, Rosa, has returned to the ranch from her convent-school in Santa Fe (which would be the well-known Academy of Our Lady of Light school once located nearby Bishop Lamy's cathedral.) She has been followed by one Ramon whom she met in Santa Fe and with whom she has had something of a chaste (one assumes) dalliance.

When Ramon visits Rosa at the ranch, Rosa's father, Augustin becomes enraged that she would invite a male friend to come over without his permission, and he drives Ramon away.

The plot thickens as Rosa attempts to assert herself against the wishes of both her parents and her grandmother, and in the process discovers important family secrets that had been strategically hidden from her.

There is a murder -- or accident, take your pick -- and many family revelations including extensive infidelity and suggestions of incest -- that lead to further outrage and finally a suicide. There are flamenco sequences, brujeria, and all manner of passion summed up by the falling of the all too rare rain.

In other words, it's a pretty standard amor prohibido  story with a distinctive New Mexico twist, and I thought the script was darned good. The cast sometimes let the pace drag a bit, and too often, too many of them seemed to be acting their roles rather than believably living them. Some sections of the dialog were in Spanish, but it seemed to me that Anaya was consciously trying for Spanish dialog that Anglos could understand most of the time, and it seemed to work pretty well. At least I could follow it pretty well except at the end where I lost the thread of the speech in Spanish spoken by one of the characters (she summed it up in English, but there was a good deal more to what she said in Spanish.) I noticed that some of the characters were trying for a "Spanish" accent when they spoke English, and I thought it might have been better for them simply to adopt the common vernacular New Mexican speech pattern and accent instead. It's distinctive in its own right, doesn't seem the least bit artificial, and lots of New Mexicans -- Anglos, Indians and Spanish alike -- use it quite naturally. But that's a relatively minor point.

I was impressed with how well done the script was. According to the notes, Anaya started working on it in 1981, only to set it aside for the next 30 years until one of his colleagues at UNM suggested he pull it out and polish it up for performance after the success of "Bless Me, Ultima" in both stage and movie versions. Polish it, he did. There were only a couple of awkward moments early on, and a bit of confusion later as some characters became enamored of one another more suddenly than seemed seemly.

All in all, though, it worked quite well, for which the Anaya and all the people involved in the production can be happy. The theater was nearly full, and it seemed that most of the audience truly enjoyed the play. Some were inclined to speak out from their seats as one or another plot twist was introduced or a character re-appeared. In another context, I might have been annoyed, but in this one these outbursts were charming.

This play could be further polished, but as it stands, "Rosa Linda" is a vital contribution to a growing body of distinctively New Mexican theater works. Some observers have referred to New Mexico as a cultural island, seemingly more "foreign" than "American," a quality of both the people and the land. That may be, and "Rosa Linda" may be another aspect of the New Mexican "island." It's familiar to anyone who is the least familiar with Spanish story-telling, and it is very distinctively New Mexican in style and spirit.

May it have a long life in the theater.

Maybe Some Snow?

Snow at Christmas, 2011 (not our house, but one nearby)

We're told that rain is on the way today and snow tonight -- most probably... But we'll believe it when we see it. Climate change has moved weather patterns mostly to the north, and that has meant that dry and mostly warm weather has persisted in our area well into December.

We went to a number of events yesterday in Albuquerque in shirtsleeve weather -- it was very pleasant, delightful really. We're into the second week of December, daytime temperatures are still in the 60's, and it's not that cold at night, sometimes dipping into the 20's. Tonight, though, the temps may get down to zero in our area, teens and single digits elsewhere. And... there is supposed to be snow...

We did some Indian Business in the morning (monthly township meeting and Christmas Party) and then took care of a good deed for one of our long time New Mexico friends who's been laid up for a while thanks to age and the physical deterioration that goes with it. She's got family, thank the gods, but I tell you, it's tough when various limbs and joints and stuff start falling to pieces and you're stuck behind a walker and you have to rely on whoever can help at the moment just to get some food in the house and a set of clothes washed. We took her her mail that had been building up out here in the country while she languishes in Albuquerque. While we were visiting, her daughter and son-in-law came by with sacks of groceries, and the dogs were thrilled that there were so many people around and something good would wind up on their plates. It's getting close to Christmas.

Then we were off to a booksigning in the North Valley featuring Rudolfo Anaya -- one of New Mexico's treasured writers and institutions -- and his new children's book, "How Hollyhocks Came to New Mexico" which is just an absolute delight, and perfect for Christmas giving. But we'll keep our copy, thank you very much!

The entire book team was there -- Los Lunas santero Nicolas Otero who did the exquisite illustrations, and Nasario Garcia who translated the English language story Anaya wrote into idiomatic New Mexico Spanish, which fits the project perfectly. Anaya himself is always a treat, hollyhocks, of course, are practically the state flower, and naturally, once again we wound up yabbering away with some of those waiting patiently in the long line as if we were lifetime friends. In a spiritual sense, perhaps we are. I don't know exactly how it works, but something draws them to us and us to them, and there it is.

The previous day we'd been to the Christmas at the Palace open house in Santa Fe, something we'd intended to do for years and never quite managed. It was your basic holiday community party, with -- of course -- that Santa Fe twist, in this case the chance to print your own Christmas card on the Palace Press. What fun. The Palace of the Governors has a wonderful santos display that I've been drawn to every time I've been there. There are dozens and dozens of characteristic New Mexico santos that have been collected from all over the state and assembled in a gorgeous exhibit in a side room of the Palace by the bookstore and in an adjacent chapel. In another room, there was a portrait of sour-faced Archbishop Lamy -- who attempted to forbid the further production and display of these "primitive" sculptures and paintings of the Saints, Our Lady, and Our Lord, saying something to the effect that they were "unworthy" of the dignity of the Church. Yes, well. That didn't go so well. It went something like the efforts of previous churchmen in New Mexico to forbid the religious  totems and icons of the Indians. Sure. Just try it. Right.

Lamy is a curious character in every way, but he is characteristic in many ways of the characters who come out to New Mexico from wherever -- in his case, France -- and make a splash for good or ill in this quirky little mountain and high plains land where a river runs through it -- "so close to Texas and so far from God (or Heaven as the case may be)".

Another one of these churchmen is Father Roca out at Chimayo who came from Italy and has spent his life transforming the Santuario into what has been called the Lourdes of America. What it's called and what it is are two entirely different things, but I guess that that's beside the point. We take it all with a grain of salt. I don't doubt the many reports of healings at Chimayo; faith can do wonderful things. For a place that is considered to be so holy, however, those who care for it and welcome its pilgrims -- and the many just-plain-folks like us who visit -- are very down to earth. We were greeted at the door by Father Roca himself when we went to Chimayo some years ago, and because there were no crowds that day, he was happy to show us around and regale us with stories and blessings. Bless his heart. You don't get that at Lourdes, nor do you have the place almost all to yourself. Do you? ;-)

We took dinner at the Plaza Cafe after enjoying Christmas at the Palace festivities. An "angel" passed by as we were getting ready to leave the Palace. She offered me a basket of blessings, and asked me to take one. I picked this one out:

Therefore will we not fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. Psalm 46

Of course...

At the Plaza Cafe, we were amid what seemed like hundreds of children, some of whom were remarkably well behaved. Others, such as the ones at one of the tables next to us, were almost as ill-behaved as their parental units. Part of it was that it was Dad's Weekend With the Children, I'm sure. Much of their food and drink wound up on the floor somehow. Hm. I wonder how that happened. Shoes were found scattered hither and yon; the staff collected them and offered them up to the parents for distribution among the little ones; as always seems to be the case, there was a lone shoe left over.

The children at the table on the other side of us were a complete contrast. Of course, it may have helped that one of their parents was Native American (I would say "Indian," but that might be confusing), with whom we had a lovely chat while we waited for our food to come. The other parent at that table was a delightful blond woman who we assumed was not of the Native persuasion, but it's sometimes hard to know about these things from appearances. When we attend Indian township affairs, after all, many of those attending with us "don't look Indian" at all! No, they don't. On the other hand, among the Pueblos, where everyone seems to have a Spanish name, it's practically impossible for Anglos to distinguish los indios from Mexicans. OMG.

Indeed, the complexities of family, community, and cultural relationships among New Mexicans are something we may never be completely sure about. One of those Mysteries, one supposes.

Though the weather is clear and sunny and shockingly beautiful right now, they say there will be rain later today and snow later tonight, so we may not go to Las Posadas in Santa Fe (where there will be many people packing the Plaza anyway, and they like to think of it as a Local Event) so we might just stay home to sip some cider by the fire and take it easy for a bit.

Maybe though...

At Las Posadas de Santa Fe, 2011 (courtesy New Mexico Museum of History)

UPDATE (12/10/12): This was the view of the Plaza last night just before the scheduled time of Las Posadas:

There were a few people scattered about, and dogs; the snow was about ankle deep -- dogs love that, and kids too. Not sure if the Posadas proceeded, as the view was restricted to this one angle and there was a layer of snow along the bottom that blocked the view of the sidewalk and street. People came and went from the Plaza in tight knots, taking pictures and oouing and ahhing and whatnot, but there was no visible procession, so quien sabe?

At any rate, the snow at our place was a treat to watch and the mugs of mulled cider we sat with by the fire were delightful.