Spanish and Italian newcomers and the Argentinian Scene (1930-1976): A gendered perspective

In this third and final part of the special issues Spanish Exile and Italian Immigration in Argentina: Gender, Politics and Culture, the spotlight is on theatre, dramatists’ narrative production, and TV drama that captures the transnational experience of Spanish and Italian newcomers in Argentina (1930–1976). In line with the series’ focus on gender, this final issue gives protagonism to women playwrights, their self-construal in autobiographical and testimonial writings, and the representation of women’s experiences in dramatic and TV productions. Theatre is an artistic field that requires the cooperation of many artists and engages in direct dialogue with the audience. It is therefore fertile soil for transnational connections. Let us take a closer look at the influences exerted by dramatists and television directors of Spanish or Italian origin and by a multicultural audience on the Argentinian scene. By the end of the 1920s and the early 1930s, Buenos Aires had an excellent reputation as a centre of culture in the Americas. This image was created partly thanks to the increasing European, especially Spanish and Italian, immigration to Argentina at the end of the 19 century. The immigrants enriched Buenos Aires’ ‘landscape of modernity with their cultural and linguistic variation’ (Sarlo 2000, 110). Buenos Aires’ residents formed a multicultural audience, eager to attend spectacles, plays and other forms of entertainment. By the middle of the 20 century, Buenos Aires had tens of theatres, most of them founded before the 1930s (Llanes 1968, 17–20). The image of Buenos Aires as a centre of culture in the Americas caught the attention of the greatest Spanish and Italian dramatists of the time, such as Federico García Lorca and Luigi Pirandello. The memory of García Lorca’s six-month stay in Buenos Aires (1933–1934), remains alive today. His plays were strongly applauded and were on stage for months at the Teatro Avenida. His visit to Buenos Aires had a positive impact on the artistic trajectory of the writer, who was welcomed as a celebrity by the porteño cultural community. On the Italian side, Luigi Pirandello travelled to Buenos Aires in 1927 on a tour with his theatre company Teatro d’Arte di Roma and did so again in 1933 when he chose Buenos Aires for the world premiere of his play Quando si è qualcuno (When One Is a Somebody) (Aldama 2015, 57). The influence of Pirandello’s work—his novels, plays, and ideas on aesthetics and philosophy—on the cultural life of the Argentina of the 1930s was reinforced by his Nobel Prize in 1934. The presence of famous Italian and Spanish