Ylenia Baglietto and Lander Otaola vindicate love and humour at the Euskalduna

Reclaiming art and culture as a healing vaccine for happiness. This could be said to be the main theme of the new show written, directed and produced by actors Lander Otaola and Ylenia Baglietto. According to the protagonists, staging this play is a leap into the void, at a very complicated time for the sector. They have done it with practically no public support, assuming all the costs themselves, a sign of their commitment to the theatre and praising its "balsam" properties. "We really like working on other people's projects, but every now and then you feel like telling what you want to tell, and that's what we've done here. We are kamikazes, but we believe that this is a world for the brave", Otaola explains.

Amor y humor' opens this afternoon at the Palacio Euskalduna and can be enjoyed until Sunday and on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th of April. It is not a play with a storyline, the aim is to attack feelings and sensations directly, and for this they have created a "strange" mixture of poetry, stand-up comedy and musical, a format that is rarely performed in the Basque Country. "It is an autobiographical performance. We are Lander and Ylenia talking about life, singing songs that have marked us, with live music by Naiel Ibarrola, one of the best performers in the Basque Country. It is a journey of an hour and ten minutes, in which we want the audience to join us".

The title that gives the piece its name is "our vital motto". For the couple, love and humour are indivisible from each other, and are also the best ingredients to be "happier". "These are dark times. We see more sadness, pain and tension in the streets. We need to laugh and feel loved. And culture and art, in all its forms, are the best remedy. People will come out of it loving life more", they say.

The text is also a kind of homage to theatre and to the people who in difficult times have wanted to make a living from it. "We refer to women, homosexuals.... All those who were not white men, come on. Also those who have been killed for their ideas, or people who have given their lives for their passion, like Bukowski or John Kennedy, Toole. We defend the fact that it is the most beautiful profession in the world," they conclude.