Sunset Boulevard in Spanish Performance: Translations on the Musical Stage

This article focuses on Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical Sunset Boulevard (1993), in order to present some relevant aspects of the production and reception of musicals both in an original and a target context. The study will first describe the eventful creative process of this musical text in its Anglophone source contexts, and will then move on to examine it from the perspective of its performance in Spanish translation. Recently translated for a Spanish-language production staged in Tenerife in 2017 (soon followed by another one in Argentina in 2018), Sunset Boulevard is a good example of the powerful impact that the importation of Anglo-American musicals has had in Spain in recent decades (see Mateo 2008) while it also serves to illustrate interesting aspects of the evolution and current situation of musicals’ production in this country. This macro-level study will therefore examine Lloyd Webber’s musical performed in sung translation, addressing it from a contextual standpoint and with a focus in Spain, with the aim of contributing to a deeper knowledge of theatre translation when it involves musical plays.