Caring for the Disappeared: Latin American History Through Theatre
The Researchers
The play REWIND is the result of a collaboration between Professor Alison Ribeiro de MenezesLink opens in a new window, School of Modern Languages, and the award-winning Ephemeral Ensemble physical theatre company.
The Challenge
In the 1970s and 1980s, many Latin American countries were governed by repressive right-wing military dictatorships. They brutalised left-wing groups, murdering tens of thousands of opposition activists across the continent and placed extreme restrictions on civil society - structures which were frequently endured after the regimes themselves had crumbled. Ribeiro de Menezes鈥� work with Ephemeral Ensemble seeks to remember those in the recent past who were tortured, murdered, or forced into exile by these regimes. Her work aims to find innovative and collaborative ways of supporting the survivors and loved ones of victims, while ensuring that new generations understand the atrocities committed in the recent past in a way which resonates with ongoing struggles for social justice.
Our Approach
Professor Alison Ribeiro de Menezes鈥� research with the survivors of repression in 1970s and 1980s Latin America has been used to develop a physical theatre performance, called REWIND. The play tells the story of one of Latin America鈥檚 disappeared, both before and after her murder, and it鈥檚 the result of a collaboration between Ribeiro de Menezes and Ephemeral Ensemble. REWIND has now been seen by thousands of people in Latin America and the UK, and it is adaptable to a wide array of contexts and venues.
Our Impact
Since its first performance in Coventry during Refugee Week 2021, REWIND has toured extensively in both the UK and Latin America. After productions in Wolverhampton and Sheffield, the play was performed in the Columbian cities of Bogot谩, Cali, and Trujillo, as well as Santiago and La Serena in Chile in late 2022. REWIND returned to Cali in the Spring of 2023, where the performances included workshops with the city Prosecutor鈥檚 Office, with a further run in the city in February 2024. Ephemeral Ensemble took REWIND to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August 2023. Here, it received widespread acclaim, including numerous four and five-star reviews and two awards: a Lustrum Award and inaugural REWIND Prize for best play dealing with decolonial themes. REWIND toured the UK in the Spring and Summer of 2024, including more than a week playing in London鈥檚 new Diorama Theatre. Arifa Akbar, The GuardianLink opens in a new window's Chief Theatre Critic said: 鈥淚 was in bits after watching it鈥� I could not have predicted the strength of my emotional reaction. I was pulled into the world of the play, empathy blurring the boundary between my experience and that of the characters on stage, and that made it thrillingly, dangerously, moving. This is what all good theatre does.鈥� Ephemeral Ensemble and Ribeiro de Menezes developed REWIND - Bosnia and Herzegovina to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Srebrenica genocide in 2025, and they performed the show in Buenos Aires, Rosario and Santa F茅 in Argentina in March 2926 as part of commemorations for the 50th anniversary of the military coup.