Friday night, I attended the premiere of What Is The Scandal?, Eliana’s one-woman show about her lives in Venezuela (A place of poverty and machismo, as she puts it) and the United States (where [t]he American dream is just an illusion.).
Eliana immigrated to this country to be with an up-and-coming San Francisco politician she met in Brazil named Ross Mirkarimi. He was a founding member of the local Green Party and a highly progressive Supervisor representing the Haight and Western Addition neighborhoods, before winning a citywide election for sheriff in November of 2011.
Shortly afterwards, there was an incident that gave birth to Eliana’s nastiest tragedy, throwing City Hall into shadowy chaos for years to come.
At the premiere, I joked with Sheriff Mirkarimi not to cite me for having an open container of beer outside of the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts. The line wrapped down the street, and I had to hustle for a spot somewhere in it. I had never been to that theater before, very much a mom-and-pop-type of place that wasn’t ready to handle the onslaught of an emerging full house. (I bet for someone, it will make a nice condo one day.)
The people who came to see What Is The Scandal? were reminiscent of the folks who attended Sheriff Mirkarimi’s recent reelection kickoff. (It’s that time again.) I saw former Supervisor Christina Olague, School Board candidate Gladys Soto, local Democratic activist Gabriel Medina, former Supervisoral candidate Juan-Antonio Carballo, and a representative from the Venezuelan consulate.
I had no idea what to expect from this show format-wise, but in the back of my mind, I knew that she was gonna fuckin’ go there. Yes, it was mostly in Spanish, and the curtain that showcased the subtitles had a wrinkle in it on the far-left side, so some of the words were difficult to read. I figured this out soon after Eliana’s strutted on stage with a cha-cha, a headset, and a dark jumpsuit. For a moment, it all seemed like an ode to J-Lo’s first-ever music concert.
What is the scandal, you may ask? If you don’t know by now (or even if you do –especially if you do), please allow me to allow Eliana Lopez the chance to walk you through it – a chance denied her by so many people within San Francisco’s elite political power structure, in some attempt to save herself from herself, one would imagine.
Once I learned from SF Gate that Eliana had done a Spanish-speaking version of The Vagina Monologues last year, everything began to make sense, from the type of show we should be expecting, to the type of Third Wave feminist force Ms. Lopez is on the verge of becoming.
Someone should ask what Eve Ensler would say about all of this.
E Pluribus Unum
In all, Ms. Lopez played twelve characters on stage, switching from Spanish to English depending on the language said character spoke. (Eliana’s own character spoke Spanish.)
Sometimes she would do slight wardrobe changes to help delineate between characters. But as an actress overall, she breathed unique style to each of the twelve masterfully, bouncing from hilarity to devastation, literally at the drop of a hat.
We have Eliana (our protagonist); Friend Matilde, Grandfather Enrique, and Eliana’s Mom (all from Venezuela); Mr. Lie (San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee); Makarroni (Ross Mirkarimi); The Neighbor (Ivory Madison); Theo (Ross and Eliana’s young son); Sheriff’s Lawyer (Shepard Kopp); Eliana’s Lawyer; and The Expert and Rich Lady (each perhaps an unspecified amalgamation of various people). Everyone laughed at the disclaimer saying any resemblance to real persons are purely coincidental. (That too was shown in Spanish.)
I am resisting the temptation to go into too much detail because I want you to buy a ticket at www.elianalopez.net and see things for yourself, but I will say this: it happened in December 2011 in Ross’s rotten jeep as Eliana’s Mom put it. The question revolved around Eliana going back home. What is the big deal if I travel to Venezuela with Theo? she asks in the show. A very big one for the stressed-out Sheriff-elect Mirkarimi, who is not known for being an extravagant spender. Let me put it that way.
He grabbed her arm in a dispute over the matter on New Year’s Eve 2011, leaving a bruise.
Enter The Neighbor, a woman Eliana was more than happy to befriend. (She finally had someone to cook with!) She sought out her counsel shortly after the incident and made a video of herself with the bruise, terrified that she could lose her son to such a formidable American politician. The Neighbor clearly put the fear into her.
The family therapy scene was illuminative. The audience learned that Makarroni had no connection to his father and feared this tale would be repeated onto Theo. Would Eliana one day return to her cherished, vibrant home and take their son with her?
I don’t know if it matters legally, politically, or even philosophically, but we learned in What Is The Scandal? that this was an isolated incident, backdropped by an upcoming swearing in as sheriff for Ross in early January of 2012. Five days later, Mirkarimi was charged with domestic violence battery, child endangerment, and dissuading a witness.
Shortly after the arrest, a terrified and now guilt-ridden Eliana turns to the audience: Oh my God. The Video!
What followed was a whirlwind of City Hall intrigue. Mirkarimi eventually plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge of false imprisonment. According to the show, Mr. Lie told Mirkarimi that he would go broke paying for lawyers. How are you going to bring food to the table?...Plead guilty to a misdemeanor, or you will regret it.
Lopez’s mustached performance of Mr. Lie was both hilarious and unsettling. Did the mayor of San Francisco really blackmail its sheriff with destitution, or was that particular performance indicative of the lurking food insecurity running throughout the Ross/Eliana household? Both scenarios might be true.
Mirkarimi was also barred from seeing Eliana or Theo until the stay away order was lifted in June, which according to the play deeply wounded them all. There was also the question of whether or not Mirkarimi could or should keep the job to which he was elected. The mayor suspended Mirkarimi in March without pay. Eventually, he got his job back but not without a price to those who supported him politically, or Eliana, who eventually did return to Venezuela briefly out of fear that Theo would be taken from her by Child Protective Services.
The rest of Scandal covers what happened over this period: the votes, the hearings, the opinions, and discussions. But when it came to Eliana, I have to quote The Expert: “We want to talk about you, not with you.”
The Violence Question
Ms. Lopez has experience some unique forms of victimization, inherent to how courts deal with domestic violence charges, her husband’s political positioning with the City Hall hierarchy, her immigrant status, linguistic barriers, and due to the fact that she is a woman. All of these issues conflated to form a dampening field around her, muffling her own opinions regarding her own life – at least until now.
I am hardly an apologist for violence. But personally I would never substitute my expertise to claim what it may or may not be in all cases where families have severe issues. One thing is for certain, however: those in government enjoy the power not only to define and to authorize violence but also to authorize any and all attempts at its erasure. And that the word "expertise" is a very precarious term indeed.
The most tragic side effect of violence is silence. So to see Eliana return to herself in such a theatrical way is beyond a revelation, beyond honesty. I lack her courage.
Curtain Call
The applause for Eliana lasted three minutes or so, maybe longer, once she finished her performance. We learned that her brother wrote and directed the show, which is almost as fascinating as how Sheriff Mirkarimi had never seen the show before that night. Think of it: a sitting elected official, under a scandal and facing a tough reelection bid this year, being portrayed by their spouse. Can you imaging Dennis Hastert’s wife Jean doing the same?
What Is The Scandal? will alter the discourse surrounding San Francisco’s Sheriff’s race but to what degree? I do not know.
Afterwards, Eliana told me that she was happy to tell her story, a simple quote for such a complex statement on feminism. So I hope the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts keeps that white wine a-chillin’. Because Eliana Lopez has something to say.
Mic check.
