🎬 The Tapa Weekend: June 14

An Almodovar exhibit, another film festival and a play based on a movie based on a play.

Jun 14, 2024

By @IanMount and @AdrianBono | June 14, 2024 | Madrid | Issue #58

🎉 Welcome to a new issue of The Tapa: Weekend Edition! An English-language newsletter about what to do this weekend in Madrid (plus memes!)

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Here Are 5 Things to Do in Madrid This Weekend

Happy Friday, everyone!

After the never ending week we’ve had (we don’t want to hear about the EU elections until 2029), we deserve a little treat. Fortunately Madrid has lots of options for you.

Yes, yes. Bruce Springsteen is in town but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other things to do here. So without any further ado, here are our five picks for this weekend.

Enjoy.

1. Pedro Almodovar’s obsession with Madrid—the exhibit

Madrid is to film director Pedro Almodovar what New York was to Woody Allen: the star of all of his films. And to celebrate his first feature film in English, which opens in October (and stars Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton), the Conde Duque Cultural Center is hosting an exhibit that examines the Academy award-winning director’s past and present in the city of sun and tapas.

Almodovar has been quoted saying: “I grew up, enjoyed, suffered, gained weight, and developed in Madrid. And I did many of these things at the same pace as the city.” He has not only captured hundreds of Madrid locations in his films, but also its soul, drawing inspiration from the people and stories he has encountered there.
This year marks 50 years since Almodóvar began his career in Madrid and this exhibit has it all. Over 200 photographs from his films allow visitors to explore key city locations through the filmmaker’s lens.

The exhibited material is mostly photos, along with 53 original pieces provided by municipal institutions such as the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Municipal Newspaper Library, the Reina Sofia Museum and the Film Library. So if you’re a fan, this is a perfect plan for you.

Madrid, Chica Almodovar. CondeDuque Cultural Center, Calle del Conde Duque 11, Madrid. Through Oct. 20. Check website for schedule. Free admission.

2. Filmadrid International Film Festival 2024

If you feel that Madrid hosts an international film festival every week, it’s because… it kinda does. Filmadrid is back for its 10th edition featuring a lineup of great independent cinema that will be screened in various movie theaters around the city such as Cine Doré, Cineteca Madrid, La Casa Encendida and Cine Paz.

This year’s opening film is Critical Zone by Ali Ahmazadeh, which “takes viewers on a nocturnal journey through the most inhospitable corners of Tehran with Amir, a drug dealer who observes and testifies to the darkness of his time”.
The official section includes films such as Familiar Phantom by Larissa Sansour and Søren Lind from the U.K. and Palestine. This film is “a profound, painful, and tender dance of memory based on Sansour’s recollections and her family’s odysseys, spanning from Palestine to Iraq and the Soviet Union, where her parents met”.
Also in the official section is Revolution +1 by Masao Adachi, Japan, in which the legendary filmmaker presents a portrait of Tetsuya Yamagami, the man who assassinated former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The festival also includes other activities such as the Cinephile Route, which tours the center of Madrid to visit popular locations of Spanish films, guided by an expert on Madrid cinema.

Filmadrid 2024. Multiple locations around Madrid. Check website for schedules and prices. Through June 16.

3. Poliana Lima’s The Common Ground

Get ready to enjoy a modern dance piece choreographed and performed by Brazilian choreographer, dancer, and teacher Poliana Lima (who is based in Madrid).

In “The Common Ground” Lima “continues to unleash her monsters—those that began to appear in her work ‘Black Gold’, continue dancing in this new show and will conclude when the trilogy finishes with “Carnival.”
Lima’s work “connects with long-standing artistic concerns revolving around identity, her favorite theme, present in almost all of her choreographic catalog. Woman, artist, Latin American, immigrant… these are realities that have fed the fiction of the Brazilian choreographer, who continues to advance in her imagination”.

“The Common Ground” stars Almudena Pérez, Darío Barreto, Darío Sigco, Malvin Montero, Natalia Fernandes, and Poliana herself.

The Common Ground. CondeDuque Cultural Center, Calle del Conde Duque 11, Madrid. June 14 & 15, 8 p.m. Tickets: €14.

4. Mercado de las Ranas Street Market

The Mercado de las Ranas is back this Saturday so if you’re wondering where to spend your hard earned euros, this is the place. (And remember, there are no frogs involved)

This street market (which we cover regularly here) is similar to the Portobello Road or Camden Town markets in London. This Saturday, stores participating in this mercado near Plaza Santa Ana, in the Las Letras district, bring their goods outside into the street so visitors can buy their favorite book, t-shirt or grab a slice of pizza on the go.

If there’s one thing we love about Madrid (and there are actually many), it’s the street market scene, and this one doesn’t disappoint. After a bit of retail therapy, grab a table at the plaza and sip a cool caña (especially now that it’s summer).

You’re welcome.

Mercado de las Ranas. All along Calle de las Huertas in Las Letras, Madrid. Saturday, June 15, Noon to 7 p.m.

5. An Independent Play: Gaslight

Did you know the term “gaslighting” comes the 1944 movie Gaslight? (Well, technically it comes from the 1938 play that the movie is based on but no one cares).

The movie is a psychological thriller that tells the story of a young woman, Paula, who becomes the victim of psychological manipulation by her husband. These days, the term “gaslighting” refers to a form of psychological abuse in which the abuser makes the victim question their own sanity. Sounds fun, no?
The plot. The couple moves into a house in London that the woman inherited from her aunt, who was murdered years before (already a promising start). Soon Paula starts experiencing strange occurrences: things disappear, she hears mysterious footsteps in the attic, and the gaslights dim and flicker without explanation. What is happening? Well, we’re not going to spoil it for you so you’ll have to watch the play.

Originally written by playwright Patrick Hamilton, this Spanish version is directed by Sandra Serrano and Laura Cuadrado and stars Marta Mestre and Carlos Palenzuela among others.

Gaslight. Teatro La Usina, Palos de la Frontera, 4, Madrid. June 15, 7 p.m. Tickets: €15.

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