During the research process of his previous film,Peret, I am Rumba (2018), Paloma Zapata came across an unexpected discovery: “I was going through the family archives with Peret’s grandson,” the producer explains to El Periódico de Catalunya of the Prensa Ibérica group, “and A photo of Colita from Antoñita La Singla dancing with Peret on the guitar. I was very impressed by his appearance, he was so young. messy hair They could only tell me that I was a deaf dancer. I looked online and there was almost nothing about it; an American page with a Wikipedia page, a few photos, and two videos with millions of views.
Thus Zapata’s interest in Antonia Singla Contreras was revealed. Dancer born in Barcelona’s Somorrostro barracks in 1948. Now, if the reader searches for his name on the internet, he will find much more information thanks to Zapata’s film ‘La Singla’, which was dedicated to him, has been shown at many festivals and will be released on November 10. An extraordinary document that sheds all possible light on an equally extraordinary character. Deaf since childhood, started dancing, following the guitarist’s hands so as not to lose the rhythm. Then it was the guitarists and clappers who had to follow him.
He breathes fire from his mouth and extinguishes it with his feet
During his dances, he would hit the ground very hard to feel the vibrations. Thus was born his intense and inescapable style. “His story is one of overcoming a person living in a very poor environment. He was isolated by deafness as a child. There was always dancing in the street. She followed the steps and repeated them. “His mother taught him the bars by snapping her fingers.” Zapata adds: “Dance was her way of communicating with the world. Being deaf gave him a special style of dancing.”
La Singlela carried the rhythm. In the documentary, it is said that she fell into the abyss because she could not listen to the music. Jean Cocteau wrote: “La Singla breathes fire from her mouth and extinguishes it with her feet.”. Salvador Dalí and Gala, Cocteau, Marcel Duchamp, Colita and Antonio Gades were some of the people who became close to him and admired his art. He starred in ‘Los Tarantos’ (1963), Rovira Beleta’s film that brings the story of Romeo and Juliet to the gypsy community. Colita took photos of Antoñita when she was 15 and became his friend, and he already looked like her. Another daughter of Somorrostro, Carmen, succeeds Amaya.
Swallowed by his own past
The film was presented as an investigation because when the investigations began no one knew whether La Singla was alive or dead. “All the information to tell his story came to me through agent Francisco Banegas. “He sent me a box full of catalogues, press clippings and records,” says the director. Another important informative element was a documentary fiction prepared for German television in 1964. he dreams of the idea that a doctor operated on him and was able to regain his hearing. In fact, he did not learn to speak until he got older and through personal efforts.
through a young woman who acts as part of Zapata’s alter ego actress Helena Kaittani, The filmmaker follows the dancer as she seems caught up in her own compelling story, marked by a father who reappears in Antoñita’s life when he senses it could lead to gainful employment.
According to Zapata, “I thought of the film as a story of a quest before I had all the information possible. I added elements of fiction, and Helena represents my search, but her voice-over also corresponds to the voice of a young woman like Antoñita. The film suggests several themes (dance, the plight of the gypsy community, abuse of power in the family) and leaves them open for the viewer to draw his or her own conclusions. Another point that attracts attention is The appearance in Antoñita’s life of the German gallerist, musicologist and jazz journalist Olaf Hudtwacker This increased the dancer’s interest in jazz so much that he designed a dance show to this type of music.
There is no case quite like the one in La Singla. Zapata remembers this “Another dancer of that period, Cara Estaca, was also deaf, and a guitarist from those years was also deaf.”Like deaf dancer María Ángeles Narváez, who learns to dance with sign language and teaches the film’s narrator to take a few steps in the film’s first scenes.