Created and performed 1999.

Devised and designed by wireframe. Scripted by Mervyn Millar.

wireframe's first, experimental piece combining puppetry and theatre, Charles Berlitz's Passport to Spanish (1972) is probably the world's first dramatic adaptation of a popular English/Spanish phrasebook from the 1970s.

In 1972, five men were caught planting bugging devices in the Watergate complex, Washington DC; Palestinian terrorists brought death to eleven Israelis, one policeman and four of themselves at the Munich Olympic Games; the Treaty of Rome was signed; pocket calculators, self-focusing Polaroid cameras and Betamax video recorders were all introduced; 30,000 people at a world nudists' convention in Yugoslavia were forced to wear clothes by the bad weather; Fischer beat Spassky; The US spy satellite programme Corona ended; Marlon Brando was The Godfather; basketball player Shaquille O'Neal was born; aviation pioneer Igor Sikorsky died, and Charles Berlitz published his 'Passport to Spanish' phrasebook.

Charles Berlitz's Passport to Spanish (1972) was inspired by the phrasebook and the events of 1972. The play was based around the structure of the phrasebook, with each chapter becoming a scene, and including direct quotations from the chapter, in both languages. No chapters were omitted, and the scenes/chapters remained in their published sequence.

These first performances began wireframe's interest in enriching the experience of the audience over that of the creators/performers, and of using a combination of performance techniques, including puppetry, to present our theatre. Charles Berlitz's Passport to Spanish (1972) was presented to a small audience, whose 'auditorium' was within the stage set - a rural Spanish café. The audience were seated in groups at café tables, the performance taking place both at the 'servery' and amongst the tables: performers and audience alike nibbled olives and drank bottled beer as the narrative unfolded.

For more information about CHARLES BERLITZ'S PASSPORT TO SPANISH (1972) please contact us.