Richard Caliban

Richard Caliban has worked as a director and playwright across the country and internationally in the UK, Budapest and Uzbekiztan. He was Artistic Director of acclaimed Cucaracha Theatre where he directed many of his plays over fourteen seasons, including Homo Sapien Shuffle at the Public Theatre.

Caliban’s MoM - A Rock Concert Musical won “Outstanding Musical” at the NY Fringe Festival and continued with runs at the Actor’s Playhouse, Geva Theatre Center and many other venues. He is also known for directing the celebrated Obie and Outer Critics Circle award-winning production of Mac Wellman’s Crowbar at the Victory Theater; and for his collaborations with Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Jules Feiffer; Michael Weller and Will Sheffer (Big Love, HBO) on the Naked Angels stage production...

Richard Caliban has worked as a director and playwright across the country and internationally in the UK, Budapest and Uzbekiztan. He was Artistic Director of acclaimed Cucaracha Theatre where he directed many of his plays over fourteen seasons, including Homo Sapien Shuffle at the Public Theatre.

Caliban’s MoM - A Rock Concert Musical won “Outstanding Musical” at the NY Fringe Festival and continued with runs at the Actor’s Playhouse, Geva Theatre Center and many other venues. He is also known for directing the celebrated Obie and Outer Critics Circle award-winning production of Mac Wellman’s Crowbar at the Victory Theater; and for his collaborations with Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Jules Feiffer; Michael Weller and Will Sheffer (Big Love, HBO) on the Naked Angels stage production and subsequent film version of Easter.

Elsewhere Caliban’s work has been seen at Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Berkshire Theatre Festival, Primary Stages, Playwrights Horizons, The Cherry Lane Theatre, The Ensemble Studio Theatre, La Mama, HERE, The Joyce Theatre, The Young Playwrights Festival, Galapagos, The Vineyard Playhouse and many others.

Caliban has been a Resident Artist at HERE, the RS9 Theatre in Budapest, the Ilkhom Theatre in Tashkent, Uzbekistan; a MacDowell Fellow and a NYSCA Panelist. He received his education at Bard College, the Yale School of Drama and the New York Film Academy.

Scripts

Cranium Fandango

by Richard Caliban

Synopsis

Androsia, a professor of anthropology, develops a strange speech disorder that eventually threatens to destroy her life.

Androsia, a professor of anthropology, develops a strange speech disorder that eventually threatens to destroy her life.

The Unusual Life of Ida Mae Couciero

by Richard Caliban

Synopsis

A modern day young woman finds herself inhabiting the body of an illegitimate child born in Victorian England and struggles to make her way to the one place she feels she belongs — Brooklyn.

A modern day young woman finds herself inhabiting the body of an illegitimate child born in Victorian England and struggles to make her way to the one place she feels she belongs — Brooklyn.

Les Funky Sisters Fantastique

by Richard Caliban

Synopsis

Les Funky Sisters Fantastique is about a Christian rock star, Wanda, who despite her religious convictions, finds herself in love with another woman, Ariel — who describes herself as a “Godless black lesbian”.

As a young girl, Wanda has a transformative experience when an angel appears to her. Years later, as a hugely successful Christian rock star who is about to be married in a much publicized wedding, she...

Les Funky Sisters Fantastique is about a Christian rock star, Wanda, who despite her religious convictions, finds herself in love with another woman, Ariel — who describes herself as a “Godless black lesbian”.

As a young girl, Wanda has a transformative experience when an angel appears to her. Years later, as a hugely successful Christian rock star who is about to be married in a much publicized wedding, she encounters Ariel in a similar way as she did the angel years ago and the two become lovers — causing a crises of faith in Wanda, who ends up in therapy to “cure her un-natural affliction”.

Chili Buttons

by Richard Caliban

Synopsis

An aging rock star appearing in a theatrical biography detailing her infamous life and career, appears to have reached the end of the road but finds a new perspective.

An aging rock star appearing in a theatrical biography detailing her infamous life and career, appears to have reached the end of the road but finds a new perspective.

The BoShines

by Richard Caliban

Synopsis

A Hippie romance.

A Hippie romance.

Famine Plays

by Richard Caliban

Synopsis

A diverse group of characters struggle with survival as catastrophic climate change
envelopes the US. and civilization unravels around them.

A diverse group of characters struggle with survival as catastrophic climate change
envelopes the US. and civilization unravels around them.

Days On Earth

by Richard Caliban

Synopsis

In the aftermath of WWI, Jane, a young poet, immerses herself in the romantic idealism of the socialist movement. She meets Sam, just back from the trenches of Europe where he has experienced a revelation on the precarious nature of life -- leaving him a committed hedonist. The two unlikely lovers, begin a rocky romance which leads us to Coney Island, the serene confines of Vassar College, Chicago’s Hull House...

In the aftermath of WWI, Jane, a young poet, immerses herself in the romantic idealism of the socialist movement. She meets Sam, just back from the trenches of Europe where he has experienced a revelation on the precarious nature of life -- leaving him a committed hedonist. The two unlikely lovers, begin a rocky romance which leads us to Coney Island, the serene confines of Vassar College, Chicago’s Hull House, New York speakeasies, labor riots, the Spanish Civil War, the golden age of Hollywood, the McCarthy era and the first landing on the moon.