La tercera fuga

3 Max Awards

La tercera fuga

Can we start over and over again?

La tercera fuga returns to the TNC after its great critical and popular success in the 2024-2025 season to bring to life once again this story that follows the trail of a family for one hundred years. The thrilling journey of three generations through multiple exiles. A magnum opus that travels through three cities and three different decades: Berdychiv in Ukraine, 1920; Buenos Aires, 1970; and Barcelona, 2020. 

Victoria Szpunberg has established herself as one of the leading contemporary Catalan playwrights, and her play La tercera fuga has earned her the Critics' Prize for Best Play, the Teatre Barcelona Prize for Best Director, and five Max Award nominations. 

A celebration of life, a reflection on identity, and a call for cultural fusion.

I'd had this project in mind for a long time, but it wasn't until my daughter asked me if her last name was Ukrainian, from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, or Argentinian, that I began to develop this theatrical fable. Without intending to engage in autofiction, La tercera fuga is based on a series of real-life events. Albert Pijuan's collaboration on the writing allowed me to maintain a healthy distance and let storytelling, imagination, and playfulness transform the true tale.

La tercera fuga begins in Ukraine in the 1920s and moves forward to the present day, passing through Berdychiv, Buenos Aires, Barcelona... It is the story of a family unable to escape the tragedy of war and forced to flee to survive, leaving their entire world behind to start anew, learning new languages, adapting to foreign cultures... It is the story of several exiles, a story about uprooting, about exposure to the elements, about what is fleeting and what endures. But La tercera fuga is also a grand celebration. We gather to celebrate that we are alive and that we have not yet lost our desire to laugh. 

We are immensely excited to return to the TNC, after the success of the first season with critics and audiences, to breathe life into this story again and for many more people to be able to see it with us.


Victoria Szpunberg

Original concept and direction
Victoria Szpunberg


Text

Victoria Szpunberg, Albert Pijuan

With
Sasha Agranov, Emma Arquillué, Anna Castells, Marc Joy, Olga Onrubia, Alèxia Pascual, Carles Pedragosa Torres, Carles Roig, Biel Rossell Pelfort, Fede Salgado, Clara Segura Crespo, Sergi Torrecilla, Ton Vieira

Set design
Max Glaenzel
Sílvia Delagneau


Costumes
Sílvia Delagneau


Characterization
Àngels Salinas


Lighting
Pedro Yagüe


Composition and musical direction
Dani Espasa


Soundscape
Lucas Ariel Vallejos


Sound
Iker Rañé


Choreography and stage movement
María M. Cabeza de Vaca


Video
Joan Rodón


Yiddish translator and consultant
Golda van der Meer

 

Argentine accent coach
Romina Cocca

Assistant director
Iban Beltran


Assistant set designer
Paula González Infante


Costumes assistant
Marc Udina Duran

 

Interns from the Institut del Teatre de la Diputació de Barcelona
Andrea Castells Fernández (direcció - ESAD)
Karen Carreño (dramatúrgia - MUET)
Clea Granados Nikolaidou (escenografia)

 

Construction of the set design
Carles Piera, Showtex


Costume making
Goretti Puente


Construction of the horse and the skeletons
Laura Garcia Martos


Construction of the masks
Eudald Ferré Serra


Production
Teatre Nacional de Catalunya

 

Acknowledgements
Família Szpunberg Witt, Jorge Spunberg, Miquel Cabal Guarro, Arnau Pons, Juan Villareal, Leo Hipaucha Serenelli, Giacomo Passalacqua, Martina Vilarasau, Josefina Torino, Leila Amorós, Manel Fortià

 

TNC technical and management teams