A well dressed stranger is rescued from drowning at the beginning of The River Bride. Photo: Jenny Graham.
Opening weekend at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival wrapped up Sunday afternoon with the world premiere of The River Bride, Marisela Treviño Orta’s delicious little play exploring love and loss against a backdrop of Amazonian folklore.
Sisters Helena, the dutiful one, and Belmira, the flirty impetuous one, live with their parents in a tiny village in the Amazon. Their lives are upended one day when a well dressed young man is rescued by their fisherman father from drowning in his nets, just three days before Belmira’s planned wedding to Duarte.
Moises, the handsome stranger, courts Helena with a challenging demand that she marry him right away; meanwhile, Belmira loses her heart to him as well. The startling resolution of the story touches on folk tales about the region’s botos, pink river dolphins that compete with humans for fish in the river.
Orta’s writing is sweetly poetic, and the play has the overall feel of a fable.
With direction by Laurie Woolery, The River Bride is uniformly well acted by Nancy Rodriguez as Helena; Jamie Ann Romero as Belmira; Armando McClain as Moises; Triney Sandoval as the father; and Vilma Silva as the mother.
Mariana Sanchez’ set is simple and effective. It relies heavily on beautiful video projections by Bruno Louchouarn; his posterized pastel images of jungle and sky have the charm of a children’s book and create much of the magical atmosphere of the play.