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Full-Lengths One-Acts Ten-Minute Plays Screenplays
Full-Lengths

Tierra - 2M, 2F

This historical play, inspired by a Diego Rivera mural called "La Maestra Rural" (The Rural Schoolteacher), is set in the 1920s directly after the conclusion of the Mexican Revolution.  Luz Jimenez, a young, innocent and idealistic teacher is sent into the interior of Mexico by the newly-installed government to educate the peasants and help them re-possess the lands promised to them by government reforms.  While the peasants embrace her wholeheartedly, she encounters opposition to her altruistic work by a rich landowner, Don Ezequiel who not only feels threatened by Luz’s illuminating the peasants of their rights, but also frustrated by his inability to woo her.  His anger and resentment are further fueled when he finds himself competing for Luz’s affections with Pánfilo, one of his own workers.  Diego Rivera adds to the conflict in absentia, inviting Luz to pose for him as the model for a mural he has been commissioned to paint in the Ministry of Education.  As the stakes are raised, Luz is forced to make an unfortunate decision, while Don Ezequiel must choose between sacrificing all that he owns in order to acquire Luz, or remain true to his nature and stand up against the onslaught of new attacks and boycotts on the part of his workers.

Miss Chihuahua - 2F, 1M

Fanny has spent her whole life trying to please others, at the expense of her own physical and emotional wellbeing.  Forty years earlier, in her native Mexico, after being crowned Miss Chihuahua and traveling to Mexico City for Miss Mexico Pageant, she auditioned for an important role in an Elvis Presley movie, but was rejected for the “darkness” of her beauty.  The action of the play begins in the present time when, three husbands later, Fanny has moved away to a rural location in the Mohawk Valley.  The only thing she can afford to purchase is a doublewide trailer due to the fact that her third husband passed away, leaving her in debt and virtually penniless on account of his secret QVC shopping addiction.  One morning, Fanny’s stepdaughter, Melanie, an investment banker living beyond her means in New York, tracks Fanny down and tries to enlist her financial assistance in a suspect, “get-rich-quick scheme” involving the stock market and bovine hormones.  Feeling guilty for not being able to help her step-daughter in the past, Fanny contemplates sacrificing her hard-earned savings in order to bail her out.  But, thanks to a pair of blue suede shoes and the intervention of “The King” himself, neither Fanny nor Melanie have to resort to desperate measures in order to make their individual dreams of independence come true.

The Eskimo Way - 2M, 3F

(under construction.)

Conditional Spanish - 2M, 1F

Arturo, a Spanish tutor, spends his therapy sessions exploring his sexual addiction and lamenting his inability to meet Mr. Right, until a new student comes along who appears to be the answer to his prayers. The action takes an unexpected turn when he realizes his new boyfriend is not all that he appears to be, and six degrees of separation have been reduced to one degree. In the midst of trying to identify his personal demons, Arturo realizes that happiness is more than just a dill pickle, sexuality is more than just a question of black and white, and that sex is not all it’s cracked up to be.

Todos Santos - 4M, 3F

It is Halloween, also known as the Day of the Dead.  The Santos family, consisting of: Dolores, mother and Coupon Queen; Alma, the bulimic oldest child who is fragile yet hard as nails; Raul, elder son and Mr. Macho; Julio, the brainy one known as the “Great Brown Hope;” and Mateo, the youngest but the wisest child, effeminate and humorous.  All of them have come together to honor the tenth anniversary of their Papá’s death in the most irreverent ways possible.  All of the action takes place in a living room in East Los Angeles.  Through the course of the action, each member of the family has a secret that must be eventually exposed.  With the aid of Benito Juarez, a local lawyer, and Joyce the Avon Lady, the family comes to realize that the chaos and confusion surrounding them is something they’ve taken great pains to create in order to feel alive.

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One-Acts

The Watermelon Factory - 1M, 1F

A young man suffering from AIDS is reunited in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, on Mother’s Day with the woman he believes gave him up for adoption at birth to the Catholic Church. The search for his mother is the only thing keeping him alive, but the woman was told thirty years earlier that her child was a stillborn female, so she refuses to cave into his desire to claim him as her son.  Although they share too many commonalities for the man to believe her story and to accept her excuses, he ends up leaving her, still unsure whether or not she is his real mother.

The Mexican Mermaid - 1M, 1F

Delfina Del Mar, an aging and ailing Mexican actress, hires Nero Arroyos, an innocent young man who is newly-arrived in New York City from Texas, to help her cope with life after pacemaker surgery.  In the course of ten years, which are performed in one continuous action, Delfina does everything possible to control Nero, even attempting to adopt him as the son she never had.  Despite the fact that Nero never knew his mother, Nero resists becoming too dependent and tries to focus on his own dreams of a career in the theater.  The play utilizes aquatic images to reinforce the ebb and flow of these two characters’ lives, pushing and pulling at each other like the tides, neither one making much progress, yet dependent on the other for strength.

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Ten-Minute Plays

Yin/Yang - 2M

Trace and Kurt have been together for twenty years, despite their opposite personalities.  On New Year’s Eve, they squabble about finances and family, but inevitably revert to the mutual affection and respect that have kept them together for so long.

Tomatoes - 1M, 2F

In a speeding car, an almost blind Granny and Jamie, her pre-pubescent grandchild of indeterminate gender, are transporting Primitivo, their Panamanian gardener, who speaks no English and might be a child molester, to the hospital in order to save his life.

Trinity in Red - 2M, 1F

The Virgin Mary, Jack the Ripper, and their gay son cope with modern-day challenges, while living in the shadow of their famous predecessor, Jesus Christ.

The Eskimo Way - 2M, 3F

(A foreshortened version of the longer play described above.)

Conditional Spanish - 2M, 1F

(A foreshortened version of the longer play described above.)

Miss Chihuahua - 1M, 1F

(A foreshortened version of the longer play described above.)

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Screenplays

La Mariposa (The Butterfly) - 6M, 3F

Alba Reynosa, a sometimes-psychic, always tasteful Latina and the retired owner of the Mexican Restaurant, La Mariposa, dreams of returning to her native state of Michoacan to witness the annual migration of the Monarch Butterfly.  The only obstacles are her three children, all of whom call upon their mother to fight their battles for them: the incarcerated Popo who had the misfortune (or fortune) of being hit by a flying horseshoe as a child; Arturo, the homosexual son who now runs the restaurant; and Adelita, the sourpuss lawyer who has distanced herself from the family.  With the help of Pancho Villa’s ghost and some grocery store coupons, Alba is afforded the opportunity to travel anywhere she desires.  The Tarot says “GO!” but her maternal instincts say “NO!”  When Alba suspects that her special herbal liniment—made with marijuana leaves—has gotten her into trouble with the law, she has no choice but to flee.  She learns that sometimes the journeys we start out on take us on a different path, but they all inevitably lead us to the right place.

The Way Home - 6M, 4F

Paul and Wally are about to celebrate their 13th anniversary but can’t agree on where to go.  Paul, a busy legal aid lawyer, wants to keep it simple.  Wally, a landscape architect and confirmed Buddhist, prefers traveling to some exotic locale like Nepal or Tibet for a spiritual pilgrimage.  The two men have drifted apart physically and emotionally.  Unbeknownst to Wally, Paul has been carrying on an extramarital affair as a means to relieve the demands of his high-pressure job.  One day, Paul gets the news that he’s sero-converted to HIV-positive status.  Meanwhile, Hack, a divorced young man of twenty-something years, has been desperately trying to see Paul for legal advice.  He’s embroiled in a custody battle with his ex-wife who refuses him visitation rights because she suspects him of sexual abusing their two boys.  Paul says he can’t help Hack without a copy of divorce settlement.  Hack goes ballistic.  In order to calm him down and get rid of him, Paul promises to see him later.  Hack leaves somewhat placated.  Later, Paul and Wally, finally agree on a compromise, a long weekend camping in the Rocky Mountains.  Once at the campsite, Wally runs into Hack in the bathroom.  They exchange words which lead to an altercation.  Hack pushes Wally, accidentally killing him; he flees and is later caught by the police.  When gay groups try to co-opt Wally as their poster-child against hate crimes, Paul realizes that in order to forgive himself for his shortcomings as a lover (and as a human being), and to finally be at peace, he must defend Hack.  The trial takes some odd turns, but eventually Paul convinces the judge and the jury that Wally’s death was accidental.

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