It’s never a good time to be denied the freedom simply to walk outside. But for Cubans, 1991 is especially terrible. The Soviet Union has collapsed – and so has its infusion of money and supplies that bolstered the island. Cruz, who also directs this online production, conveys how the lack of basic goods turns every day into an endurance test.
TWO SISTERS AND A PIANO Captures Uncertainty
Among the sisters’ many privations, restricted mail delivery tops the list. Maria’s activist husband lives abroad and his letters, communicating both romance and coded strategic updates, have stopped. Is he alive? Does he still love her? Can he get her out of Cuba?
Unmarried Sofia plays classical composers with a soulfulness that captures the sisters’ loneliness and uncertainty. Relief seems possible when two men enter their lives, each with something Maria and Sofia desperately want. First, a military officer assigned to their case (Jimmy Smits) pays a visit with a sack of withheld mail. Then, with the lieutenant’s help, a piano tuner (Gary Perez) comes to service the off-key upright. New Normal Rep, an exclusively electronic theater company, fuses the geographically-separated cast into one weary living room.
Already a fan of Maria’s provocative fiction – which she insists are simple love stories – Lieutenant Portuondo falls hard for the writer as he reads some of her husband’s letters aloud. Lozano’s Maria melds seductiveness with such caginess, the besotted man asks “When are you going to trust me?” Smits sounds so vulnerable and sincere, it almost feels like the Castro regime careerist should be trusted.
