Some lucky folks on the dating trail have had the experience of the spontaneous combustion of two sets of hormones leading to hasty retreat to a private place for some personal passion. But what happens when the spell is broken before the intensity culminates?
In Barcelona, the highly-decorated Bess Wohl’s two-hander, drunk and ditsy Irene chases Manuel out of a bar and they hastily retire to his nearby apartment to satisfy their urges. The encounter is so chaotic that Irene hasn’t even provided her name, and she often refers to him as Manolo, despite being corrected each time. In her alcohol-fueled stupor, she also has lost a shoe, not realizing that she had thrown it at Manuel.
We soon learn that Irene is from Denver and attending a bachelorette weekend in Barcelona as a prelude to a wedding back home. Manuel is proudly from Madrid, and the small apartment in Barcelona is a legacy, which Irene calls “cute” like so many other things. A charming building, it offers a spectacular view of Gaudi’s distinctive Sagrada Familia church, which looms on the set’s backscreen. But the apartment is strewn with moving boxes as the building is to be razed the following day to make way for modern progress, a stark contrast to the century-long gestation period of the nearby basilica.
In this 90-minute talkathon, we find that the characters, now clumsily connected and isolated, are chalk and cheese. Adria Swan’s “typically American” characterization of Irene depicts her as bubbly, self-referential, superficial, and naïve. To her counterpart’s disdain, she repeats the story of her ancestor pioneers trekking from the east to Salt Lake as a big part of her personification…..
Per agreement with Talkin’ Broadway, my complete reviews of South Bay and Peninsula theater for the remainder of the year will appear in full on its site. Please continue at:
San Jose/Silicon Valley – “Barcelona” – 9/30/26
Barcelona, written by Bess Wohl, is produced by San Jose Stage and is performed at its playhouse at 490 South First Street, San Jose, CA through October 18, 2026.
