Spencer Morgan

An Exploration of the Use of Space, Music, and Social

World in Lola Aria’s My Life After

In Lola Aria’s play, My Life After, we see 6 Argentinian artists, 4 actors, a dancer, and a

musician, reenact and retell the stories of their childhoods from the position of the parents during

the coup d’état in 1976. These artists take on something from the past as a way of understanding

a part of their present and future. In the play, My Life After, Aria uses space, music, and social

world to illustrate the impact of social turmoil created by the coup d’état on the youth in

Argentina.

In the world of My Life After, space is largely created and distinguished through lighting

and spotlights rather than through the use of a conventional set. The actors in My Life After, take

to different corners of the stage to share personal stories about their families and their

experiences during the coup d’état. When these stories and family histories are share, the actor is

lit by spotlights that isolate them from the rest of the stage and any other cast members that

might be onstage. Using spotlights to isolate the actors as they share their experiences is

representative of the isolation that they felt as children. Many of the actors share stories about

not understanding what was going on around them, their parents going missing or having grand

secrets, or being separated or neglected during this period. The nationwide turmoil that was

created from the coup d’état shifted the older generations focus form caring for the children to

surviving in the volatile climate, isolating kids growing up during the coup d’état. While space is

largely defined with lighting in My Life After, there are moments in the show where the actors

construct a space. At one point a box, in which the actors remain for a scene, is drawn on stage
with chalk. At the top of the show, the space is marked with a phrase written in chalk. The actors

also construct a vehicle with 5 chairs and pantomime for one of their stories as well. Each of

these acts of constructing space is very childlike. When building the car and pantomiming, their

movements are like children at play. The use of chalk to define space, like a child playing

outside, also gives a youthful feeling to the world of the play. The use of childish behaviors and

tools in the distinction of spaces that are shared, in contrast with the isolating spotlights, is

representative of the need to find or construct a safe space as a child growing up during

strenuous times like that of the coup d’état.

Aria also uses music to convey this message. Throughout the show the actors will sing

and play instruments. However, rather than being in the style of music from the mid-70s, the

actors are playing in the style of modern rock and are using very modern instruments. After the

first actor addresses the audience, they pick up an electric guitar and begin to play a repetitive

riff as the other actors grab clothes from a great pile that was dropped at the top of the show. In

this song there are no lyrics, and as the solo grows louder the other actors begin to grow more

chaotic, running around and swinging clothes. In this opening scene, the lack of lyrics and

repetitive nature of the music, coupled with the chaos of the other actors, is used to represent the

tone of the actors social environment during their childhood. Like the music, there was a large

amount of chaos, confusion, and overwhelming noise from their social environment during the

coup d’état. The next time that music is played, the same actress plays the electric guitar, this

time singing and being accompanied by drums. In this scene, the actress sings “I get on a

motorbike, towards the past. In a city that no longer exists, I run into my parents, and they’re as

young as me.” After this the lyrics begin to describe protests and marches with soldiers present.

The music played in this scene is also incredibly loud and repetitive. However, the noise is given
context, drawing a direct line from the coup d’état taking place at the time and the overwhelming

noise of the actors childhoods. The representative nature, alongside the lyrics about riding into

the past and encountering their parents, also comments on the longevity of the impact that the

volatile social climate had on the youth of the time.

Lastly, Aria uses social word to illustrate the impact of the coup d’état on the youth in

Argentina, specifically the way in which social world is signified through clothing. At the start of

the show, the actors, from above the stage, drop down a large pile of their parents clothing.

During their first entrances, each actor takes their parent’s clothes from the pile and puts it on.

On occasion, some of the actors change their clothing, each time looking more and more like an

adult or like their parent. Throughout the entirety of the show the actors are dressed in the

clothing of their parents. The actors tell their stories from growing up in the middle of the coup

d’état from their own perspective, while dressed and embodying their parents. The donning of

adults clothes while sharing the experiences of their childhood represents the need for the actors,

when they were children, to reach a kind of adulthood much more quickly than is typical of most

children. Because of the tumultuous times in which they were raised, some of them losing

parents at a young age or not having parents around much, they had to grow up very quickly.

My Life After, written by Lola Aria, explores the lives of six Argentinian artists who grew

up during the 1976 coup d’état. The play uses isolative spaces defined by lighting and shared

spaces created in childlike play by the actors, modern rock music performed live onstage, and a

social world represented through the clothing of the performers’ parents to illustrate the impact

that the coup d’état had on the artists during their childhood and after.