Alex Chand

In Avonte Oquendo, I reframe the disappearance of a Black, autistic student, 14-year-old Avonte Oquendo, from his high school in 2013. The play is focalized through Avonte’s perspective and focuses on his quest to become independent as well as his want to listen to good music and be “cool.” The play follows Avonte as he navigates the transition from middle to high school while also documenting his quest to become a “cool” man: hanging out with his brothers, his adventures playing Temple Run, jamming to Jay-Z, and helping out around the house. Competing with this narrative is his disappearance from school, which Avonte attempts to make sense of in this play both through his teenage quests and relationship with his family.

Olivia, Katie, Jayne, and Grace spend their time playing and building worlds together while growing up in Kentucky during the first Obama administration. As they work together to understand how their world is changing amidst the backdrop of rising geopolitical tensions, their increasing awareness of the politics of race and gender, and an economic recession, their relationships with each other suddenly unravel when a traumatic event unfolds. In the aftermath of the event, the four sisters are dispersed across the US South. Fifteen years later, the sisters must come together, despite their estrangement, when the perpetrator of the traumatic event re-emerges to wreak havoc and threaten to drive the sisters apart forever.