The comic theater of the thirties and the representations of Topaze and Juan Verdejo on stage in Chile

Abstract

How has the lower classes humour in times of crisis expressed? That is the invitation the author makes us, as he goes over the most remarkable episodes of chilean comic theater and comedians during the tuffest Great Depression years. The stages, the locations, the artists and even the titles of the comic performances refer to a bohemian life that has long been lost in Santiago. Through a press research, Maximiliano Salinas makes us witnesses of the disputes between the elite cultura representatives and the folk humour supporters which is best represented in the figure of a ficticious character named Juan Verdejo. As in a carnival, we understand that de roughness and suffeering in life become, trough this artisans of the gesture and the ingeneous word, into an explosion of artistic creativity as it gives a fight to economic depression, as well as the psycological one.