"More than 60% of the population may have suicidal thoughts"

BarcelonaIn the lobby of the Sala Talleres at the National Theatre of Catalonia (TNC), a shower of folded papers fills a glass urn. At the top, a message asks the audience to write "a small moment of happiness" that can be read aloud. Teenagers from the Sunsi Móra Institute in Canet de Mar crowd around the table, pens at the ready and the infectious laughter of their age. "I have two. What did you write?" one of them asks. "I won't tell you, but it's obvious, girl. Write both!" the other replies. The students, perhaps more shy or perhaps less enthusiastic, watch them from afar, but every now and then one of them approaches the table and carries out the assigned task. They all make up the audience that attended a school performance this Thursday of TarsivusA show by Lara Díez Quintanilla, directed by Ferran Carvajal, that tackles youth suicide head-on and without subterfuge.

The stage is the gateway to the stories of Tània (Gisel Morros), Carles (Daniel Mallorquín), Roger (Quim Gil), Marta (Carla Moix), Sígfrido (Tamara Ndong), and Adrià (but as young adults), with Adrià (Joan Lluís) all converging on the same point: the attempt to end their lives. Adrià carries the burden of his brother's overdose, Carlos suffers bullying and unhealthy overprotection from his mother, Tània was a victim of sexual abuse, Marta stops eating because she wants to disappear, Sígfrido feels uprooted from everything, and Roger tries to be perfect.

"Suicide is surrounded by many myths, and it's important to break them down. This show helps us do that. Between 70 and 80% of suicide deaths are linked to mental health, but increasingly this is not always the case," explains Clara Rubio, a member of the Catalan Association for Suicide Prevention (ACPS), in a talk. Tarsivus It places the protagonists in a kind of limbo where they can't stop talking and confessing everything that's going on inside them. "How can I think about this? I'm sorry, I'm sorry," one of the characters wonders when it occurs to him that dying is the only option. "More than 60% of the population can have suicidal thoughts. We're very afraid to verbalize it, but it can happen to any of us. It's essential to know, above all, that suicide always has an alternative," Rubio points out.

Understanding the character

Faced with the most difficult sensations and feelings to express aloud, Ferran Carvajal has chosen to transform them into movement. The performance choreographs moments of anxiety and anguish, profound shame, guilt that leads to self-harm, and deep loneliness. "How does it feel to play these characters?" a young woman from the audience asks during the discussion. "The abstraction of the body allows you to represent things that would be emotionally very intense. For the audience, it's easier to process than if everything were absolutely explicit," Morros emphasizes. "We work constantly to understand the character, tell their story, and let our bodies be the transmitters," Gil adds.

Lara Díez Quintanilla has a degree in psychology and has previously explored themes related to mental health in her work. TarsivusThe film, showing until November 30, was constructed from numerous interviews with witnesses, a creative process similar to the one she followed with AdriftA collaborative piece that revolved around psychiatric hospital admissions and premiered in May. This time, the show primarily reflects that ending suicide requires a collective response. Rubio summarizes it this way: "Suicide is multifactorial, but there are shared elements: a feeling of loneliness, the capacity to do it (what we find on social media doesn't help), and the absence of a sense of belonging, the belief that we are not loved by anyone. Talking about suicide doesn't kill."