The Violence of Everyday Life: Lope de Vega's Fuente Ovejuna as Urban Allegory

In the wake of Spain's economic crisis and the accompanying surge of anti-austerity social movements such as 15M, theater groups and dramatists in Madrid looked to Spanish playwright Félix Lope de Vega y Carpio's canonical play Fuente Ovejuna with renewed interest. This paper discusses two interpretations of the play that emerged from this trend: one staged in the central patio of a classic corrala in Aranjuez in 2013 by the theater collective AlmaViva Teatro, and the other a 2015 adaptation by dramatist Juan Mayorga performed by the theater group La Joven Compañía in the Centro Cultural Conde Duque. I argue that the script adaptations and the staging used by each performance demonstrate how Fuente Ovejuna remains a compelling alegoría de poder for contemporary society by emphasizing the original work's preoccupations with the relationship between violence, power, and sovereignty. I also contend that they should be understood within the geography of the city and the architectural legacy of the respective performance sites. These adaptations resonate deeply with the material realities of the contemporary city and the spatial politics of cultural production during Spain's economic crisis and its aftermath.