Benjamin Gonzales

Benjamin Gonzales

Benjamin is an Assistant Professor of History, Literature, and Playwriting at Viterbo University. He previously served as a guest Instructor for Lighting Design and Theatre Technology at the University of Central Missouri and is also formerly an Associate Clinical Professor who taught an array of Theatrical subjects at Washington State University that included Lighting Design, Playwriting, and Media Literacy....
Benjamin is an Assistant Professor of History, Literature, and Playwriting at Viterbo University. He previously served as a guest Instructor for Lighting Design and Theatre Technology at the University of Central Missouri and is also formerly an Associate Clinical Professor who taught an array of Theatrical subjects at Washington State University that included Lighting Design, Playwriting, and Media Literacy. Benjamin recently earned an MFA in Theatre Arts (focused on Dramatic Writing) from the University of Idaho. He also has a Master in Teaching and a BA in Theatre Arts and Drama from Washington State University.

Benjamin currently serves as the National Vice-Chair of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival's (KCACTF) National Playwriting Program (NPP) and has previously served as the Representation, Equity, and Diversity (RED) Coordinator. Professionally, Benjamin is a theatre generalist with experience in Lighting Design, Set Design, Sound Design, Technical Direction, Production Management, Direction, as well as Playwriting. He specializes in writing verbatim plays that highlight the stories of students who have in some way been marginalized. He also writes scenes and short plays for his students to use for contemporary scene work.

Plays written by Benjamin are as follows: Seeing the Obvious (1998), Roadblock (2002), It Starts Now (2012), The Performance Project ’13 (2013), Las Memorias ’13 (2013), A Bus Stop Home (2013), Turnabout is a Fair Play (2013), The Performance Project ’14 (2014), Gigglemug (2014), The Performance Project ’15 (2015), Las Memorias ’15 (2015), Las Memorias ’16 (2016), The Valley (2016) The Lion and Lamb (2016), Las Memorias '17 (2017), Memoria de Oaxaca (2017), Up Chimacum Creek (2018), VOUCHer (2018), The Good Soldier (2018), Sour Mash (2019), and Aristophanes v. Euripides: Dawn of Poetic Justice (2020).

Plays

  • Sour Mash
    FULL LENGTH: What do you get when you mix a lot of whiskey, a slew of poetry, a sexless marriage, and a lot of people at the wrong place at the wrong time? You get a mash bill that turns quite sour. This farce is utterly ridiculous, and fun for most of the family.

    Warning: This play also contains an evil desk.
  • VOUCHer
    FULL LENGTH. It is the beginning of a new school year, and the Prairie Valley Creek Elementary Parent Teacher Association is short on parents because they were all lured away by The Happy Bridges Charter Academy on State Street. On the lighter side of dark comedy, VOUCHer follows the comings and goings of the small group of parents left at the P.V.C.E.P.T.A. as they struggle to re-level the playing field.
  • Up Chimacum Creek
    FULL LENGTH. Give me a noun, an adjective, and a proper name. As young Willie Almeida and his friends return from a fishing trip, they witness an event that they wind up being irrevocably tied to. The kids grow up, and find out that life isn’t all fun and games. Up Chimacum Creek is a portrait of a young man whose journey for identity becomes at odds with his relationship with death.
  • The Lion and Lamb
    FULL LENGTH. It is Christmas, and It has been a year since Albert, the Fegan family patriarch, has passed. Albert had left his legacy to his family, a pub called The Lion and Lamb, but it is now going under. The Fegan family intends to celebrate Christmas as it always had until all of the problems so far ignored by this family come to the daylight when Albert's estranged son Martin comes home in disgrace.
  • Aristophanes V. Euripides: The Dawn of Poetic Justice
    One Act. Written for online. The world is changing, Aristophanes and Euripides are an unlikely writer team-up confronting their greatest nemesis; the actresses who call them out.
  • The Good Soldier
    One Act: Mark and Mary Cohen have taken in a tenant, a former soldier, and they find themselves playing host to a greater conspiracy. Inspired by the work of Harold Pinter, this is a protest piece by the corrupt American administration of 2016-2020.
  • Turnabout is a Fair Play
    ONE ACT. Music, murder, and a Madonna face print shirt. Turnabout truly is a fair play. After completing their opus, Geoff and David need to somehow get it produced. Who better to fund their endeavor than their slightly racist and homophobic landlord that already doesn't like them. Good idea... Write it!
  • A Bus Stop Home
    ONE ACT. At a bus station in a small rural town in Central Washington, a young man, beaten by burden, finds direction due to a chance encounter.
  • Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress Upon Human Life and Thought... Abridged. Or Gigglemug
    SHORT PLAY (15pg.). Art Coy accidentally built a time machine. The Baron Herbert George Wells accidentally got caught in it's wake. In this One Act farce, Art needs to get The Baron back to his own time before his wife, Clara, catches on.
  • Memoria de Oaxaca
    ONE ACT: Memoria de Oaxaca is a story about the family of Thiago and Renata. Their eldest daughter, Sara Gabriella, finds herself burdened with the responsibility of helping raise her 5 younger sisters and brother. After an amazing night at the The Fiestas de los Lunes del Cerro, Sara Gabriella escapes the family for seclusion, but finds herself lost in the woods. The journey home is fraught with danger, but...
    ONE ACT: Memoria de Oaxaca is a story about the family of Thiago and Renata. Their eldest daughter, Sara Gabriella, finds herself burdened with the responsibility of helping raise her 5 younger sisters and brother. After an amazing night at the The Fiestas de los Lunes del Cerro, Sara Gabriella escapes the family for seclusion, but finds herself lost in the woods. The journey home is fraught with danger, but with the help from an unsuspecting friend, she finds herself back where she belongs.
  • The Valley: A Creation Story
    10 MINUTE PLAY: Deer, Rabbit, Salmon, Crow, Sparrow, and Eagle live peacefully with each other in The Valley, until King Coyote enters with his Siege. Taking over the valley, King Coyote chases out those that are not like him. Lobo arrives, who equals King Coyote in ferocity, to help restore the valley to it's once peaceful glory. While The Valley functions as a creation story, it also is an allegory of...
    10 MINUTE PLAY: Deer, Rabbit, Salmon, Crow, Sparrow, and Eagle live peacefully with each other in The Valley, until King Coyote enters with his Siege. Taking over the valley, King Coyote chases out those that are not like him. Lobo arrives, who equals King Coyote in ferocity, to help restore the valley to it's once peaceful glory. While The Valley functions as a creation story, it also is an allegory of our instinctual relationship to the land, and each other.
  • My Turn
    A Monologue