The play is indeed one of the best theatrical works of 2024 and even of recent times, as many critics have pointed out. The audience seems to confirm this, intuitively knowing that they are witnessing a theatrical phenomenon.

The show is one of those rare artistic events that embed themselves in your soul and memory, resonating strongly for a long time, changing your sensibility and transforming the paradigm of how you see yourself in the world and perceive the planet around us.

Elisa throws us into a dual, surgical gaze—microscopic for our humanity and telescopic for the cosmos—reframing, with this dual perspective, both the insignificance and importance of humanity in this infinite universe. She opens new possibilities for values in our affections, our roles in interrelations, and our larger relationship with the biosphere in times of climate crisis.

Elisa does not fall into many of the childish and mediocre traps that plague our stages, such as populating the stage with actor-ideologues who consider themselves semi-gods, self-invested proselytizers of a perfect world. Her actors reveal themselves and us without filters and with all their contradictions and idiosyncrasies. Another recurring mistake on our stages that Elisa wisely avoids is the cult of a certain chic blasé posture, full of melancholy nihilism, which is nothing more than a snobbish pose, pompous bellyache, vain and arrogant erudition, the pure counterface of a clown's fart. On the contrary, her scene invests in the limits of all possible and unimaginable vitalizations: whether it be the maximum potentialization of intelligence and affective circuits or the maximization of sensitivity and a wisdom considered abyssally unfinished, and therefore, fiercely curious, insanely charismatic, poetic fury, and erotic enchantment.

Elisa Ohtake is one of the most rigorous, inventive, and vigorous artists and creators on the contemporary scene. She has slowly built, step by step, grain by grain, an authorial work with her own language, a unique poetics and aesthetics of rare coherence and complexity. But in "AQUI elevated to 1.000.000.000.000," she presents a mature work, thickened by accumulated knowledge from many areas of the performing arts—dance, theater, performance—and also from a profound wisdom in the visual arts. With rare conceptual mastery and incredible technical arsenal, Elisa signs the dramaturgy, staging, and direction of actors in the show, marking her strong signature but without failing to place the actors and their performances as the essential axis of her scenic conception. It is moving to see the director-pedagogue avidly share in the exaltation that the audience shows for each actor's work after the show. This appreciation of this characteristic aspect of theatrical tradition, combined with the subversive way in which Elisa traverses this tradition with other avant-garde theatricalities, is another proof of the maturity and complexity of Elisa's work, especially at a time when most artists who self-proclaim as defenders of a new scene prefer the common sense of proclaiming the death of theater, an unequivocal arriviste gesture.

One of the things that touched me the most about the show is how Elisa approaches the content of her works, with enormous subtlety and a deep will to translate the mystery. At a certain point, her aesthetics remind us of an oriental perspective, of Kurosawa's apocalyptic landscapes, and the abstractionism, sense of forms and colors of her grandmother Tomie. Terrifying and sublime.

Being the epicenter of her work, her ensemble of actors reveals itself magically with full force, each with their highlighted creative individuality. Who wouldn't dream of Mario Bortolotto's Sesc Paulista? And who didn't want to shout as a child: "I'm not taking a bath no way!" The audience goes wild, as Elisa's work, like her audience, detests false intellectualism. Aretha Sadick is a scandal. Luckily, Nature is prodigious, and in each new cycle, it can produce an artist with the potency of Denise Assunção. Maria Manoella is even more subtle and volcanic, Rodrigo Pandolfo is splendid, with a hypnotizing grace, Paula Picarelli is scandalously beautiful and capable of a magnetic imagination. Roberto Alencar is cuttingly sweet and grave, Ricardo Oliveira, whom I hadn't seen in a long time, exudes freedom, fantasy, irreverence, and disconcerting musicality. Everyone shines. And what an apotheosis to see Georgette glorious, equating her performance to her best works on stage, like her Stella do Patrocínio, Joana from "Gota D’Agua," or one of the leaders of the Charenton asylum theater group in "Marat Sade." I miss this titanic Georgette, transcending and blending all theatrical genres and styles. Performance deserving of all awards. She deserves it.

Do not miss this play. It will be one of those unforgettable experiences, as only the sublime and ephemeral nature of theater can provide.

Ruy Cortez

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AQUI 1.000.000.000.000 in its insistent excessiveness creates a transition between embarrassment and pleasure, melancholy and euphoria, boredom and excitement, astonishment and admiration: this is Elisa Ohtake's sublime cynicism. There is something visibly precise amidst the formless chaos that accumulates monologue after monologue, present in a phrase, in an unexpected gesture. In descriptions of images, descriptions of anti-images; liminal spaces, the absurdity of reality, and a journey through places that never existed and always will, through the before that only manifests in the now. In the end, there remains a desire for all of us to be HERE, elevated to a trillion, deeply contemplating and inhabiting the problem where we live.

Amilton De Azevedo

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"O Teatro, esse Sol estranho, maior que a Vida." 'AQUI elevated to a trillion' has conception, text, direction, set design, and soundtrack by Elisa Ohtake. Having at her disposal a cast of stars, to begin with, and not being indulgent with this cast is practically a miracle. I swear I've never seen such unison in my life. The show has its language, and everyone on stage is in sync with the spectacle. There are eleven actors, and even though they deliver monologues, no one is "doing another play, but that's okay." The fluency is perfect, and the "pauses" are intentional, with a pretentious nonchalance (oops) in the unfolding of it all. "Look, we're going to spend an hour and a half setting up the scenery, and then the play starts, which will last 15 minutes." Or Maria Manoella calling Georgette Fadel "Forfete Jadel." There is relaxation and virtuosity. A glory for the actors on stage. EVERYONE is excellent, and this allows the message to impose itself because, yes, ladies and gentlemen, the play has something to say. It's not a jumble of words or a portrait of a dead world. It's about our dying and (chemically) polluted world, about the quality of presence and the role of theater, "this strange sun, greater than life," which in the near future will be the only thing that will make us present, as Elisa prophesies. The show often references the Sublime in Kant, referring to something that is not only beautiful but also terrifying, and I can say that the play achieves that. I couldn't sleep until after 5 AM. It's a pity that the term (sublime) is so banalized that it can describe a well-brewed coffee or be used as a brand of toilet paper, so I'll simply say that 'AQUI elevated to a trillion' is a volcano erupting, and Elisa is ready to direct The Magic Flute at the Municipal Theater.

Antônio Furtado

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The name of the play is "AQUI Elevated to 1 Trillion." It could be called "The Standup of the End of the World." Run to the theater now.

Marcelo Tas

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"Aqui elevated to a trillion," by Elisa Ohtake. How good it is to go to the theater, especially to watch such a good play! Wow! How good! With unparalleled direction, set design, costumes, and acting. I left deeply impacted. A special impact always comes from seeing Georgette Fadel on stage. But all the actors are wonderful.

Thelma Guedes

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Elisa Ohtake and her radical and alive theater, beautiful and full of crises and a trillion other things...

Roberta Martinelli

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Direction, dramaturgy, soundtrack, and lighting are impeccable, as are the scenes with Maria Manoella, Rodrigo Pandolfo, and Georgette Fadel.

Cesar Ribeiro

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An ecstasy elevated to a trillion, watching friends shine in this play with a very urgent hot text and direction by Elisa Ohtake.

Andreia Horta

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Aqui Elevated to a Trillion is magnetic. Elisa Ohtake is one of our most powerful contemporary voices.

Natália Lage

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Elisa Ohtake is an event. And what a cast!

Bruno Garbuio

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In June, at the Thèâtre National La Colline, I attended “Avant la terreur” (Before Terror), based on Shakespeare's Richard III, written and directed by Vincent Macaigne: on a muddy stage, the king murders in the name of a desire with no direction. At the Comédie Française, I also saw “Les démons” (The Demons) by Dostoevsky, directed by Guy Cassiers: young nihilists want the revolution by destroying everything that stands. At the Teatro Sesc 24 de Maio, I saw yesterday “Aqui Elevado a Um Trilhão” (Here Elevated to a Trillion) by Elisa Ohtake. She brings to the stage the waste produced by the capitalist world: once again, humanity and its destructive drive.

Without Richard III and without the Russian demons, we are now faced with the waste capable of destroying mankind. On stage, characters are not looking for an author but a place, a “here” in the Greek agora for the present. Actors and actresses set aside theatrical interpretations of past centuries and rummage through the trash. Hurrah! Laughter as an effect of confronting the real, of despair, of dead ends, is what we see. The common idea of “throwing it away” has turned against humanity. The Freudian “Das Unheimliche” pours over the earth and decays it. Is it theater? Is it literature? Yes, but who says theater and literature don’t know more about us than we do ourselves?

Ohtake, in the face of the malaise of existence, brings life to the stage: the young juggler Alison Guega, who travels the world, plays with his wanderings. He lives in the “here and now”: that is what interests him. My applause to Elisa Ohtake and the Cia. Explodida, who can summon the entire world with each play, for insisting on theater. Standing ovation for Mário Bortolotto, the resilient artist from Teatro Cemitério de Automóveis, who always makes something out of the trash, rain or shine. I left the theater melancholic but with a desire to live. Today, I will once again attend another play. Long live culture!

Geraldo Martins – Psychoanalyst

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THE INSTANT IS A BORDERLESS ABYSS

"AQUI ELEVADO A UM TRILHÃO" (Here Elevated to a Trillion) by Elisa Ohtake, currently showing at Sesc 24 de Maio, uses metaphor and anti-metaphor to cosmicize the scenic discourse. It may be the first Brazilian play that explicitly demands from the audience an autopoeisis. Like a lucid 'kosmic blue' seeking to crack the dome, including the dome of autofictional categories, expanding the experience to a border that demands not only catharsis but the immanent, calling for a politics of immanence, similar to the production of Hamlet by Andrei Tarkovsky or recent films by Radu Jude. Although the Romanian filmmaker lacks what is abundant in “AQUI ELEVADO A UM TRILHÃO”: a certain synergy of affection, Elisa and the cast are traversed by the dual microtexture of tragedy that seeps from the layers of the spectacle that dares to stretch the speculum of insoluble exteriority instead of merely exposing the symptom. In “AQUI ELEVADO A UM TRILHÃO DE ANOS” (Here Elevated to a Trillion Years), the symptom is a starting point for the vertigo of a necessary trance-outburst that transforms the dystopian into tragic and the tragic into utopian thought. In the broadest sense of the concept, utopian thought is 'a way of glimpsing the hidden virtualities in immediate reality and dreaming of another reality, a society ideally more perfect than the one we live in. It is the desire to transcend the immediate in which we are immersed.'

Poems and problems persist, becoming paradoxical topologies; humor and terror also do. “AQUI ELEVADO A UM TRILHÃO” can be seen as a successful attempt at osmotic or hybridization between paradox and topologies, making it a singular event within the spectrum of contemporary Brazilian theater, a borderless spectacle.

Marcelo Ariel

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THE BEST OF THE FIRST SEMESTER

The first semester has ended, and Arte8 wants to share with you our list of the 10 best plays of this semester. Of course, we missed many plays, but we managed to watch 62 performances. The top 10 were:

1 - Aqui Elevado a Um Trilhão (Here Elevated to a Trillion)

2 - O Vazio da Mala (The Empty Suitcase)

3 - Puma (Oswald de Andrade Workshop)

4 - Tio Vânia (Uncle Vanya)

5 - O Veneno do Teatro (The Poison of Theater)

6 - Gabri (elas) (Gabri (the women))

7 - O Diário de Um Louco (The Diary of a Madman)

8 - Todas as Coisas Maravilhosas (All the Wonderful Things)

9 - Copo Vazio (Empty Glass)

10 - Dias e Noites de Amor (Days and Nights of Love)

Arte8

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With a well-regulated cast, a trillion times above what is seen, and truly seeking a type of language that advances in the form of what theater and performance investigate, “Aqui Elevado a Um Trilhão” is pure parresia. Highlighting the excellent sound design and the extraordinary final scene defended by Georgette Fadel.

Denying various senses of the “classic scene” and replacing much of the aesthetic framework with an enraged and unpleasant torpedo of truth. Showing the anticlimax brought by the “real” and fabricating the “almost unfabricable” – this is the great question of the production, beyond its theme, beyond its form, and, above all, far beyond the final product.

Elisa Ohtake, not without first defining a recognizable language (but not blind to diverse readings), masterfully architects these issues. Parresia involves the pursuit of some possible answer regarding what has not even been precisely formulated in debates about contemporary art.

Deus Ateu