←Recommendations of DERECHO

I've enjoyed seeing this play develop over the last couple of years! It was especially timely during the 2020 US presidential election, and will continue to have great impact as more of the Latinx diaspora fight for equity and equality.

A powerful look into what we define as success when ultimately it may mean cutting off important parts of ourselves and losing our root of family. While searching for external validation, we may end up missing the greater meaning of life. Well done.

I had the pleasure of seeing DERECHO at the 2020 BAPF. Noelle has created nuanced characters who are able to talk about complex issues without ever feeling didactic. This is exactly the kind of theatre I love to see: thought provoking, emotionally wrenching, and plenty humorous. I hope that this play receives a full production soon- I would love to see it.

This play builds like a quiet storm. Each crumb building to an explosive reckoning. It is a play about sisters, family and communication and how control when cloaked in love tools to control ones narrative about self. I was lucky enough to catch the second rendition during BAPF2020 and it did NOT disappoint!

I just caught the BAPF reading of this and was absorbed in the relationships and theatrical world that Viñas created. Eugenia and Mercedes' relationship is an absolutely compelling nucleus that this story centers around, but each and every character is distinct and vividly-rendered. I was most struck by the exploration of the intersection of the personal and political here, and also with Viñas' skill in crafting such nuanced and astute conversations about compromise, politics, and identity that feel so organic. The dreamlike, fantastical moments that punctuate heighten and deepen our experience. Potent surprises come at satisfying intervals. Marvelous!

Derecho is a gut punch of incredible storytelling. I'm struck by the beautiful, messy, complicated relationship between these two sisters Mercedes and Eugenia, of course. But I'm also floored by how each character in this play has a direct and distinct relationship with at least two other characters in this world -- relationships that breathe full and complete life into each and every one of them. I want to see this play produced over and over and over again. There is so much to mine here. It's beautiful, Noelle!

We are pleased to support this play! It was a Finalist for the 2020 New Works Festival at Kitchen Dog Theater in Dallas, Texas.

The sheer poetic heft with which Noelle Viñas has suffused "Derecho" would be enough to make this play a standout; that she embraces its huge themes with a laser-focused precision that drives the work forward with the fury of the titular storm shows why it has deservedly won so many awards and accolades.

These are the stories that need to be told today. The blending of fantasy and naturalism works so well and perfectly represents the conflicting worlds Latinx so often need to inhabit at all times. This is a memory play that’s as good and better than anything by O’Neill and Williams that is so often performed and just needs to die already!!! These characters and their voices are critical to the American story but they have been absent from our stages. Fix that by producing this play!!!

Premiere Stages, the professional Equity theatre in residence at Kean University, is pleased to recognize “Derecho” by Noelle Viñas as a semifinalist for the 2019 Premiere Play Festival. “Derecho” rose through a competitive selection process conducted by Premiere staff and a panel of outside theatre professionals to become one of 23 semifinalists out of 659 submissions. The panel was particularly impressed by the play’s probing exploration of the value that U.S. society places on assimilation, whiteness, and non-white, non-Anglophone stories and traditions. It is wonderful to see a playwright tackling such fraught, important topics. Our congratulations and thanks to Noelle.