Scott Caan photo exhibition Hollywood Reflections on Calle Uruguay

Like a film set for a movie whose actors have not yet been chosen, Panama City has the improvisatory air of a casting call. One in which the extras are not quite sure where to position themselves. In this way its chaotic and desolate streets are sometimes reminiscent of a scene from a Hollywood movie.

The writer Laurence Durrell, who renounced his British origins preferring to be known as a cosmopolitan, said in his book The Alexandria Quartet that “to ruin your whole life in one place means you waste it anywhere in the world.” Every time my friend Ehrior comments that the streets of this capital look like they could be anywhere in Los Angeles, I recall the words of Durrell. Both reflections are a warning rather than a compliment.

The explosive development of Panama – with only one hundred years of history as an independent country- produces such bright flashes that it is difficult to picture the country in black and white. Even though black and white are similar to the colors of the dollar that gave the city its colorful look, with which, every day, it puts on its makeup and winks at the tourists.

The color is everywhere. In each gap between two buildings there is a tree, in each space between two trees there is a power line and on each power line there is always a bird singing in the rain. The charm of a developing city (the work of the Metro, the expansion of the Canal, the third phase of the Cinta Costera and the restoration project of Casco Viejo are a few examples) goes hand in hand with the chaos of the building process. People are delighted with the result, but the process usually disenchants them.

With much of the world turning its radar toward Panama these days, no one here is carrying a GPS. Still the Panamanians are discovering more interesting places every day. One of these is the exhibition hall of the Manrey Hotel, in the bustling commercial area of Calle Uruguay, where a very special photographic exhibition is showing.

This is the off-screen work of actor Scott Caan, famous for his roles in all three parts of the “Ocean’s Eleven” saga. In those movies he plays a likable thief, but this time Scott Caan is offering part of his personal treasure for free, so that lovers of black and white photography can dream behind the scenes of his adventures: photos of Hollywood sets, stolen moments between takes with Brad Pitt, Dennis Hopper or Matt Damon, and California actresses with dyed hair and tattooed feet.

The most compelling photo in the show was taken on the red carpet at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival in France. That year the actor climbed the stairs to the festival palace with his trusty Nikon camera (a gift from his father, who inherited it from Francis Ford Coppola). When he reached the top step he turned and suddenly took a shot of the hundreds of photographers who were preparing to photograph him.

That impulse was an act of brilliance, whose magnetism is seen at its best in the black and white photo now on display at the Manrey Hotel. The exhibition is open at least until April 7. Echoes of Hollywood in the middle of Calle Uruguay: my friend Ehrior was right. Durrell too. Telephone contact Manrey Hotel: 203-0000

MEDIA
BOCAS DEL TORO

SECTION
BOCAS NEWS

DATE
Marzo, 2012