Augusto Amador

Augusto Amador

Augusto was born and raised in the Silicon Valley and his the son of an accomplished Peruvian Jazz composer and Austrian chef. Upcoming his play Atacama will have a staged reading at Theatre 80 in NYC as part of the Downtown Urban Arts Festival. His play Kissing Che has recently been published by Black Rose Writing.
Mr. Amador was recently awarded a generous playwriting grant as part of the Lincoln City...
Augusto was born and raised in the Silicon Valley and his the son of an accomplished Peruvian Jazz composer and Austrian chef. Upcoming his play Atacama will have a staged reading at Theatre 80 in NYC as part of the Downtown Urban Arts Festival. His play Kissing Che has recently been published by Black Rose Writing.
Mr. Amador was recently awarded a generous playwriting grant as part of the Lincoln City Fellowship from the Speranza Foundation in NYC. Augusto’s play, Atacama, placed in 50 Playwright Project’s 2017 list of best unproduced Latino plays https://50playwrights.org/the-50pp- list/50pps-best-unproduced-latin-plays-2017/ as well as a runner up for the 2017 National Latino Playwriting Award from the Arizona Theater Company, semi-finalist for the 2017 Eugene O’Neill Conference and finalist for the Austin Playhouse (top 10 out 700 submissions). Recently, Augusto’s play, The Book of Leonidas, had a staged reading at the Cherry Lane Theater as part of the 2017 Downtown Urban Arts Festival in NYC and was awarded BEST PLAY. Augusto was a writing fellow with the 2016 Humanitas Prize. His latest co-written screenplay, Ratcatcher, placed in the 2015 TOP 50 Academy Nicholl Fellowship Screenplays and begins film production summer 2017. Previously, Augusto was a playwriting fellow with the Emerging Writers Group at the Public Theater in New York. Two of Augusto’s plays are published in the Proscenium Theater Journal. In addition to the Public Theater’s Spotlight Series, his plays have also been produced or presented at: Cherry Lane Theater NYC, ACT Seattle, Firehouse Theater in Richmond, VA, The Lark Play Development Center, Stella Adler Studio NYC, Terra Nova Collective’s Groundbreaking Series, Repertorio Espanol, Red Room, Queens Theater in The Park, INTAR Theater, Los Angeles Theater Center, Celebration Theatre, Audrey-Skirball Kenis Theater Projects, Playwrights Arena, The Blank Theater, Ricardo Montalban Theater, Imagined Life Theater, Will Geer’s Theatricum Botanicum, Celebration Theater, John Anson Ford Theater and the Inkubator new play reading series at the Skylight Theater as well as a playwright residency at the Arkansas Repertory Theater in Little Rock, Ark. His plays have been finalists or semi-finalists for the Eugene O’Neill Conference (2011, 2015, 2017), Princess Grace Award, Terrence McNally Award, Local Theater Lab in CO, NTAR Playwright’s Lab, NHMC TV Writers Program, New Works Labs at Stratford, Metlife National Latino Playwriting Award, Bay Area Playwrights Festival , The Arch and Bruce Brown Foundation, Kitchen Dog New Play Festival and the Hormel New Play Festival at the Phoenix Theater as well as being a finalist for theClifford Odet Ensemble New Play Commission from the Lee Strasberg Theater &Film Institute. His play, Kissing Che was named in HowlRound’s,“101 Plays by The New Americans, or on Latinidad”. Augusto is a member of the Dramatist's Guild.

Plays

  • The Quiet Zone by Augusto Amador
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    3
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    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 2 more
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    Keyword: #mental illness, Motherhood/ Womanhood + 6 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, immersive, tragedy
    Keyword: #mental illness, Motherhood/ Womanhood, appalachia, Drama, 2 female power roles, #relationships, #justice, morality
    THE QUIET ZONE
    A middle-aged woman, Krista, has found relief from her mental illness and sanctuary from her turbulent past residing in a remote Appalachian town and engrossing herself in her garden. But when her estranged daughter, Becky, suddenly arrives, Krista becomes increasingly paralyzed by her presence; as Becky’s hidden motive for her arrival reveals that Krista can no longer evade the...
    THE QUIET ZONE
    A middle-aged woman, Krista, has found relief from her mental illness and sanctuary from her turbulent past residing in a remote Appalachian town and engrossing herself in her garden. But when her estranged daughter, Becky, suddenly arrives, Krista becomes increasingly paralyzed by her presence; as Becky’s hidden motive for her arrival reveals that Krista can no longer evade the consequences of being an absent mother. A story about lost and rediscovered motherhood.
  • Atacama by Augusto Amador
    Recommendations: 2
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    Cast: 
    2
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    Genre: drama, mystery/thriller + 2 more
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    Keyword: Latino; historical drama; drama; two-hander; romantic; loss and forgiveness, Eugene O'Neill semi-Finalist
    Genre: drama, mystery/thriller, political, tragedy
    Keyword: Latino; historical drama; drama; two-hander; romantic; loss and forgiveness, Eugene O'Neill semi-Finalist
    Thirty years after the dirty war waged by the General Pinochet regime on the Chilean people. Two strangers search the Atacama Desert for their buried loved ones and discover there are darker truths awaiting them underneath the hard sands of the Atacama. Atacama is the final play in Augusto's Latin-American Dictator Trilogy Series.

  • The Book of Leonidas by Augusto Amador
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    6
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    Genre: docudrama/historic, drama + 4 more
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    Keyword: Latino, Great roles for seniors + 7 more
    Genre: docudrama/historic, drama, mystery/thriller, period, political, tragedy
    Keyword: Latino, Great roles for seniors, great roles for older actors, Eugene O'Neill semi-Finalist, Afro-Latino, Dominican Republic, Latino Playwrights, Downtown Urban Arts Festival, two-hander.
    Lenny is a Dominican-American hustler selling loosies on the same street corner in Queens that his father, Leonidas, used to rule over as legendary crime lord in the '70's. From his loosie profits he supports and lives with his repressive mother who derides him for not living up to Leonidas' criminal legacy. Lenny finds an escape while working on his graphic novels until he stumbles into love...
    Lenny is a Dominican-American hustler selling loosies on the same street corner in Queens that his father, Leonidas, used to rule over as legendary crime lord in the '70's. From his loosie profits he supports and lives with his repressive mother who derides him for not living up to Leonidas' criminal legacy. Lenny finds an escape while working on his graphic novels until he stumbles into love with a pretty white girl, Lindsey. As their relationship deepens, the pressure of who he wants to be and who he was meant to be, careen into a final conclusion. The Book of Leonidas is the second play is Augusto's Latin-American Dictator Trilogy of plays.

    The Book of Leonidas was developed through the Los Angeles Latino Theater Alliance L.A.
  • Kissing Che by Augusto Amador
    Cast: 
    5
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    Genre: docudrama/historic, drama + 4 more
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    Keyword: Transgender, Cuban + 8 more
    Genre: docudrama/historic, drama, mystery/thriller, period, political, tragedy
    Keyword: Transgender, Cuban, Latino Playwrights, African American, 1980's, LGBT LGBTQ, historical drama, Eugene O'Neill semi-Finalist, historical, Afro-Cuban
    Miami, Florida, 1984. Four years after the Mariel Boatlift, a man named Reina is dying in a nursing home claiming to have been Cuba’s last famous drag queen and to had a passionate love affair with the Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara. Tamika, an African-American nurse, strikes up a friendship with him. United by untold pasts, shared confessions change their lives forever against the background of Cuba in the...
    Miami, Florida, 1984. Four years after the Mariel Boatlift, a man named Reina is dying in a nursing home claiming to have been Cuba’s last famous drag queen and to had a passionate love affair with the Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara. Tamika, an African-American nurse, strikes up a friendship with him. United by untold pasts, shared confessions change their lives forever against the background of Cuba in the late 60’s and 70’s, when Castro regime begins it’s systematic and brutal persecution of homosexuals.

    Kissing Che is the first play in his Latin-American Dictator Trilogy series.

    Kissing Che was developed through the Public Theater in NYC. Kissing Che was a finalist for the Terrence McNally Award and a semi-finalist for the Eugene O'Neill Conference and many others. Kissing Che was presented at the Public Theater Spotlight Series, Blank Theater, Celebration Theater and Skylight Theater and named by Howl Round as one of the top 101 plays about Latinidad. Kissing Che is published in the Proscenium Theater Journal.
  • Solterona by Augusto Amador
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: drama, tragedy
    Genre: drama, tragedy
    An unmarried daughter in her late 30's struggles to find a semblance of her own life while caring for her repressive mother.
  • Fresno by Augusto Amador
    Cast: 
    4
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    Genre: drama, mystery/thriller + 1 more
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    Keyword: Latino Playwrights
    Genre: drama, mystery/thriller, tragedy
    Keyword: Latino Playwrights
    “My pops used to tell me this story of how I was born... that when my mama spit me out of her...I was like a cold piece of meat that he held in his hands, until he baptized me in a sink filled with water. And just like that I came to life. A little, purple and red Lazarus raised from the dead.”

    So begins Ernie’s life of struggle: The struggle of a stillborn. At thirty-three, he is a recovering...
    “My pops used to tell me this story of how I was born... that when my mama spit me out of her...I was like a cold piece of meat that he held in his hands, until he baptized me in a sink filled with water. And just like that I came to life. A little, purple and red Lazarus raised from the dead.”

    So begins Ernie’s life of struggle: The struggle of a stillborn. At thirty-three, he is a recovering junkie who
    now has found strength in sobriety and Jesus. It’s been fourteen years since Ernie has been back home or
    spoken to his father, the Old Vato, a tough alcoholic and retired butcher who holds the answer to Ernie’s failures. “You dream like a child who cries. Who cries and don’t know why.”

    Hoping the Old Vato will reveal what he knows; he returns home and runs into his estranged half-brother, Paco, who has come home with his own views of the world.As Paco says,“We about as welcome in this life as a three-legged dog,carnal.”

    Through dreams, Ernie begins to uncover his past or is it all lies?

    As half-brothers and father race towards their destinies so does the full consequence of finding one’s identity.

    So goes the Old Vato,“The butcher cuts because he has to. It’s how he makes his luckas. But who is man’s butcher? And what happens when his flesh is cut? What happens when he sees the color of his bones?”
  • The Sunset Room by Augusto Amador
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: drama, tragedy
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    Keyword: Lincoln City Fellowship, Speranza Foundation + 5 more
    Genre: drama, tragedy
    Keyword: Lincoln City Fellowship, Speranza Foundation, playwriting grant, Afro-Latino, Latino, about death, hospice. end of life
    Prison inmate, Victor Robles, begins to rediscover his humanity working as a caretaker in his prison’s hospice. But he soon realizes that penitence is merely one small step on the hard road to forgiveness.

    *To be written and developed from a generous grant from the Speranza Foundation.