High Season 2025: Putin's trial, Ostermeier's 'Hamlet', and a six o'clock funeral

BarcelonaThe Temporada Alta festival unveiled a new director and a new lineup this Thursday. Narcís Puig took over from Salvador Sunyer, pursuing the goal of "maintaining the established path throughout all these years," with a lineup featuring major international names and new productions by Catalan talent. The festival will take place from September 18 to December 12 in the Girona region—particularly Girona and Salt—and will feature 92 shows and 28 premieres, with a budget of nearly €3 million.

Major international names

In its effort to bring great names from the international scene to Girona, Temporada Alta is programming 16 shows from 13 different countries. One of the main shows is the Hamlet by German Thomas Ostermeier, a production that premiered eighteen years ago and that the festival had been pursuing for some time. "It has defined international theater in the 21st century, and we have fought hard to bring it to Girona," emphasizes Puig.

Another notable presence is Belgian Miet Warlop – "a name that has been emerging in recent years," says Puig – who will be coming to Temporada Alta for the first time with the concert-performance Inhale Delirium ExhaleThe Canadian company Cirque Éloize will also return to Girona, with ID EvolutionIn parallel, the festival will host the Basque group Collectif Bilaka, which reinterprets traditional dance in Gernika; the Swiss Christoph Marthaler, who in Subdues him makes a sharp critique of power, and the Bulgarian director Gallin Stoev, who will present The Hague, one thriller court where Vladimir Putin is being tried. There are three special musical events: a concert by The Crystal Fighters, two by Patti Smith, and another by the Chicago Mass Choir.

For years, Temporada Alta has established a solid bridge with Latin America, where it will also host interesting shows. The festival features two performances by Romina Paula, one of the hottest names on the Argentine scene: Shadows, of course and Everyone commentsThe Argentine Marina Otero will be back in Girona to present now The craft of dying, in which he explores the body and illness. The production about family memory will come from Mexico. Young lion by Conchi León; and from Chile, the participatory show It will be a day that will last for years. The theatrical deconstruction of Jimena Márquez The dismantling and the documentary piece Printers by Lorena Vega will also be seen at the festival.

Aside from this entire catalog, there are two shows with Catalan roots but internationally co-produced that are added to the program: Seppuku. Mishima's Funeral, by Angélica Liddell, and We: us and time, by Mal Pelo. The first revisits the funeral of the Japanese writer Mishima, promises radicalism and poetry, and will begin at 5:30 a.m. The second is a large-scale show about the transmission of dance.

New Catalan creations

Temporada Alta will be a hub of Catalan creation, with more than 60 offerings from our country. One of the main events is led by Uruguayan Gabriel Calderón, who will a similar experiment to the one of'Story of a wild boar' with Alas! Misery will make us happy. starring Pere Arquillué and Laura Conejero. The festival will also feature the adaptation of Death and Spring that the dance company La Veronal has done, which premiered with applause at the Venice Biennale and before the TNC will open.

Jordi Galceran and Sergi Belbel will once again team up, in this case with Rural tourism, a black comedy with Borja Espinosa and Alba Florejachs, while the caloric Júlia Truyol will be under the orders of Rubén de Eguía with Tenant, a play about a generation expelled from their homes that will premiere at the Akademia Theatre in Barcelona and then travel to Girona. The T de Teatre will premiere Today I will not cry, a text about family ties directed by Nelson Valente, and Miriam Iscla and Dafnis Balduz will star Honesty, directed by Francesc Cuéllar, which will explore the tensions between a veteran actress and a young director during a shoot.

The program includes a show about memory and death. Alphabet, by La Moukhles & Sentís; the work on cancel culture Cutting your foot with a chainsaw, by Bárbara Mestanza, and We, the nameless, by Mos Maiorum, with dramaturgy by Joan Yago – all three can also be seen in the Beckett Room–. "We want to help young people under 30 make the leap with larger productions," says Puig. Among the productions aimed at young people are, in addition, Burpees, by Miquel Mas Fiol. From the Balearic Islands also comes Marta Barceló with The last six days, a delicate text about the death of a mother.

Readings of classics and returns

Part of the program is made up of shows that have appeared in Barcelona theaters and that the festival will now bring to Girona. Dancer Lorena Nogal's solo Picaza; the visual theater piece Manual for living beings, from La Mula, and History of love, by the Señor Serrano Group, premiered at the Grec Festival, are three examples. There will be two proposals from playwright and director Josep Maria Miró: the dark The monster, Quim Masó Award 2024, and the shocking The housekeeper, with Rosa Renom at the helm. It's also worth not missing the impressive Throat, with Oriol Pla, who returns to the festival, and the multi-award-winning The day of the Watusi.

One of the pearls of Temporada Alta are the readings of classics that the festival commissions each year from renowned actors and directors. This year, David Verdaguer will perform a selection of De profundis, by Oscar Wilde, directed by Xavier Albertí. Elisabet Casanovas will read the Newspapers by Anaïs Nin in La Planeta and Nora Navas will recite texts by Simone Weil, Eulalia de Anzizu and Saint Teresa in the Girona Cathedral, accompanied by theensemble The Rest Project. And Lluís Homar will give a recital-concert with texts byThe Brothers Karamazov. In addition, the traditional Playwriting Tournament will continue for another year, reaching its 15th edition.

In music, the festival will unite Joan Miquel Oliver and Meritxell Neddermann on stage, as well as Mushka and 31 Hambre. Regarding family theater, Temporada Alta has scheduled, among other shows, Matras, by Campi Qui Pugui –one of the most international Catalan companies–, and Pinocchio, with which Roseland Musical will celebrate its 40th anniversary.

Proposals from outside Catalonia

The Basque director and playwright María Goiricelaya – who was already at the festival in 2023 with Altsasu– will be in Girona with a contemporary review of Yerma, by Federico García Lorca. Lolita will also visit the festival, in this case with Poncia, where he plays one of the central characters of The House of Bernarda Alba, while the Aragonese puppeteer Javier Aranda will lead Arrow, which combines flamenco with poetry. There will also be two concerts by Andalusian artists—Estrella Morente and Zahara—and a dance performance. Of Sheherezade by Maria Pagés.