GROOMING

Original title: 
Grooming
Agegroup: 
Adults
Cast: 
1f, 1m
Author: 

A man and a girl. A bench in a park, next to it a street lamp. The man speaks, the girl is silent. The man asks the girl to tie his shoelaces. The man demands a sexual favor. She does what he asks. The man and the girl met via the internet and meet for the first time. But gradually, the roles shift, and the man gets into distress.
Imagined identities, suspense à la Hitchcock, manipulation and dark desires drive this tense, thriller like, play.
Aside of cyber-grooming and paraphilia, the central issue of the play is interpersonal communication and its adulteration: the way in which violence is perpetrated on others and how a power gap ultimately builds up and changes.

Grooming premiered in February 2012 at the Madrid Teatro de la Abadía. Paco Bezerra received the Spanish National Prize for Drama in 2009.