Bunuel_Luis_My_Last_Breath

Paris (1923-1929) 87to play the silent parts of the four people in the audience, which ishow the cast came to include Cossio, Peinado (who played the innkeeper),and my cousin Rafael Saura (Don Quixote).The work was performed a few times in Amsterdam and playedto packed houses. The first evening, however, I'd completely forgottento arrange for lighting, so the audience saw very little. Workingovertime with a lighting designer, I somehow managed to getthings ready for the second night, which went off without a hitch.The only other time I directed for the theatre was in 1960 inMexico: Zorrilla's perennial Don Juan Tenorio, a beautifully constructedplay which he wrote in a week. It ends in Paradise whereDon Juan, who's been killed in a duel, finds that his soul has beensaved because of Dona Ines's love. The staging was very classical, afar cry from the satirical scenes from such classics we used to do atthe Residencia. It played for three days in Mexico City during theFeast of the Dead ard was so successful that during the stampede toget in, the windows in the theatre were broken. Luis Alcor~za playedDon Luis, and I played the role of Don Juan's father, but my deafnessmade it difficult for me to follow the lines. I kept playing nervouslywith my gloves until Alcoriza finally walked over and tapped myelbow in the middle of a scene, as a sign that my turn had come.In Paris, I went to the movies far more frequently than I had inMadrid, often as many as three a day. Thanks to a press pass I'dinveigled out of a friend, I saw private screenings of American filmsin the morning at the Salle Wagram. During the afternoon, I wentto a neighborhood theatre, and in the evenings to the Vieux Colombieror the Studio des Ursulines. Actually, my press card wasn'tentirely undeserved. Thanks to Zervos, I wrote reviews for Cahzersd'Art as well as a few publications in Spain. I remember writingabout Adolphe Menjou, Buster Keaton, and von Stroheim's Greed.Among the films that made strong impressions on me was Bat-//ah$ Potemkin, and even now I feel again the emotion it aroused inall of us. When we left the theatre, on a street near Alksia, we startederecting barricades ourselves. The police had to intervene before we