In the play All the Wonderful Things, a seven-year-old boy discovers that his mother has been overcome by sadness and has lost interest in staying alive. To make her change her mind, the boy spreads messages around the corners of the house so that she can see the delights of everyday life, such as the refreshing taste of ice cream or the beauty of the sun and the color yellow.
The text by Englishmen Duncan MacMillan and Joe Donahue fell into the hands of Rio de Janeiro actor Kiko Mascarenhas, aged 59, in 2016, and his reaction was denial, somewhat reactive: “This play is about depression, suicide, I have no idea willingness to talk about it on stage.”
Translator, adapter and researcher Diego Teza immediately responded, claiming that it was nothing like that. “It’s a story of resistance and hope”, he explained. At this point, Mascarenhas’ head turned and he saw the plot from a different perspective, with the way he started to interpret it since its debut in Rio de Janeiro, in 2019.
Five years later and crossed by a pandemic that gave it a new meaning, including for the protagonist, All the Wonderful Things arrives in São Paulo during the season, running at Tucarena since last Friday, the 8th, under the direction of Fernando Philbert.
Over the course of the plot, the boy grows up, enters college, starts working, falls in love, is excited about his marriage and suffers from his separation, always dealing with his mother’s depression and writing lists to enjoy one day at a time.
Until the time he discovers that these notes serve as a stimulus for himself – whether at seven years old, at 17, after 30 or at 59, it is no coincidence the age of his interpreter today. “The play talks about how we can move forward and, if we use our imagination, we will live better in the present and be able to look to the future”, says Mascarenhas, who, in four decades of his career, delivers his first monologue.
Depression
The interpreter who debuted All the Wonderful Things in 2019 it is quite different from what is showing in the capital of São Paulo this week. Mascarenhas, who has always been a calm, optimistic guy and not prone to melancholy, felt the heavy burden of depression in the final stretch of the Covid-19 pandemic.
In March 2020, when the world stopped, he suffered from the end of a long relationship decreed a few months before, and social isolation served as a movement of salvation, a reconstruction of himself so that, single again, he could move forward with his boat. .
The actor sunbathed on the balcony, cooked a lot, learned to bake bread and drew, drawing like crazy. “My house became a studio”, he jokes. He put work aside in 2020 and 2021 and only realized how bad he was when he returned to a television studio to once again face the routine of nine or ten months of recording a project and trembled with the fear of not being able to handle the responsibility. .
The constant bouts of anxiety and panic were diagnosed as depression, and Mascarenhas only thought that he could die at any moment. “I couldn’t get out of bed, I couldn’t answer the phone and, when I left the house, I caught Covid and became more disorganized,” he recalls. “At this point, treatment with a psychiatrist, medication, therapy came and I gradually got back on my feet.”
Mascarenhas understood that that show about resistance and hope took on another meaning for the artist and for human beings. “After going through this experience, I went on stage with a different mentality because, now, I talk about myself, I identify with and am torn apart by the character’s pain”, he acknowledges.
The lists themselves
Before resuming editing, in July last year, the actor began to draw up his own motivation lists. He took a long trip to Portugal and Spain, ate and drank well, enjoyed sunny days and laughed with his friends.
“The medication had an effect and I felt capable of making decisions, such as returning to the show with the play”, he says. “It may seem silly, but I valued the beauty of seeing the rain falling and smelling fresh coffee.”
For the São Paulo season, the artist has a list ready that should dictate his steps over the next four months. He, who lived in São Paulo in the 1990s, intends to meet up with friends and meet new people, walk in Ibirapuera Park and Minhocão, discover newly opened restaurants and exchange ideas with whoever is going to watch the show.
“I was never one to get down, I was always the guy who would put on a song, dance alone in the middle of the living room and be okay with what happened to me, until, one day, I found myself paralyzed and unable to react” , he declares. “We should never forget that our minds can get sick and this piece lifted me up again.”
Service
All the Wonderful Things. Tucarena. Rua Monte Alegre, 1024, Perdizes. Friday and Saturday, 9pm; Sunday, 6pm. R$ 100.00. Until June 30th. From March 8th.
Tags: forget mind sick Kiko Mascarenhas depression
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