Martín Zimmerman

Martín Zimmerman

Martín Zimmerman is a multi-ethnic, bilingual playwright whose work spans a wide variety of styles, but always aspires to a seamless unity of aesthetic and story.

His plays include Seven Spots On The Sun, White Tie Ball, The Making Of A Modern Folk Hero, The Solid Sand Below, and Let Me Count The Ways, and have been produced or developed at The Kennedy Center, Goodman Theatre, Cincinnati...
Martín Zimmerman is a multi-ethnic, bilingual playwright whose work spans a wide variety of styles, but always aspires to a seamless unity of aesthetic and story.

His plays include Seven Spots On The Sun, White Tie Ball, The Making Of A Modern Folk Hero, The Solid Sand Below, and Let Me Count The Ways, and have been produced or developed at The Kennedy Center, Goodman Theatre, Cincinnati Playhouse In The Park, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, La Jolla Playhouse, LCT3, Victory Gardens Theater, The Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s National Playwrights Conference, Marin Theatre Company, The Playwrights’ Center, Alliance Theatre, A.C.T. (Seattle), PlayPenn, Icicle Creek Theatre Festival, American Theater Company, The Theatre @ Boston Court, Chicago Dramatists, Primary Stages, Teatro Vista, Cara Mía Theatre Co, Seven Devils Playwrights Conference, The City of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs, Theatre Row, Illinois Shakespeare Festival, Borderlands Theater, Source Festival, The Gift, Collaboraction, Red Tape, The University of Texas at Austin, and Duke University.

A recipient of the Terrence McNally New Play Award, Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award Citation, Humanitas Prize New Voices Award, Sky Cooper New American Play Prize, McKnight Advancement Grant, Jerome Fellowship, Carl Djerassi Playwriting Fellowship, National New Play Network’s Smith Prize, and a Core Apprenticeship at The Playwrights’ Center, Martín has been the Alliance for Latino Theater Artists (ALTA) Artist of the Month, was a member of the 2011-2012 Playwrights’ Unit at Goodman Theatre, is a Playwright in Residence at Teatro Vista, a Resident Playwright at Chicago Dramatists, and has been a finalist for the Kendeda Competition, Heideman Award, and Bay Area Playwrights Festival.

MFA in Playwriting: The University of Texas at Austin. BA in Theater Studies, BS in Economics: Duke University.

Plays

  • White Tie Ball
    After being elected the first Latino Pima County Attorney in half a century, Edward Moreno’s bond with his brother Beto is the strongest it has been in years. But when one of Beto’s former friends kills an on-duty police officer as she breaks into the friend’s home without identifying herself, Edward has to prosecute the case. The decisions Edward faces about what charges to pursue not only put his career in...
    After being elected the first Latino Pima County Attorney in half a century, Edward Moreno’s bond with his brother Beto is the strongest it has been in years. But when one of Beto’s former friends kills an on-duty police officer as she breaks into the friend’s home without identifying herself, Edward has to prosecute the case. The decisions Edward faces about what charges to pursue not only put his career in jeopardy; they also re-ignite long-suppressed tensions between Edward and Beto, who share the same parents but not the same skin color.
  • Let Me Count The Ways
    Inspired by the true story of the first modern pornographic publication, Let Me Count The Ways follows a battle between the libertine poet Pietro Aretino and the pious bishop Gian Matteo Giberti over the mind, loins, and soul of Clement VII, the first post-Reformation pope. Also caught in the struggle between Aretino and Giberti is the fate of 16 sexually explicit prints (entitled ‘The Ways’) that will forever...
    Inspired by the true story of the first modern pornographic publication, Let Me Count The Ways follows a battle between the libertine poet Pietro Aretino and the pious bishop Gian Matteo Giberti over the mind, loins, and soul of Clement VII, the first post-Reformation pope. Also caught in the struggle between Aretino and Giberti is the fate of 16 sexually explicit prints (entitled ‘The Ways’) that will forever transform the history of print media.
  • The Solid Sand Below
    Julian Flores narrowly escapes a prison sentence and lands in Iraq where he’s anything but a model soldier. But when an I.E.D. blast nearly costs him his life, something changes for Flores. Soon the adrenaline, clarity, and intimacy of battle become something he can’t live without—even after he returns home.
  • Seven Spots On The Sun
    The village of San Isidro has been without its doctor for eighteen months. Moisés has remained a recluse, refusing to even look at a patient, since the day the army took his wife away during the country’s civil war. But when a mysterious plague begins to ravage the countryside around San Isidro, the local parish priest convinces Moisés to take action. And when Moisés examines his first patient, he discovers he...
    The village of San Isidro has been without its doctor for eighteen months. Moisés has remained a recluse, refusing to even look at a patient, since the day the army took his wife away during the country’s civil war. But when a mysterious plague begins to ravage the countryside around San Isidro, the local parish priest convinces Moisés to take action. And when Moisés examines his first patient, he discovers he has the miraculous power to heal this plague with the touch of his hand. But among the thousands of pilgrims who flock to San Isidro, Moisés is forced to confront his past, and San Isidro the violence that tore it apart. A meditation on mourning, redemption, and revenge, Seven Spots On The Sun follows each character’s attempt to come to terms with the extraordinary loss they have suffered and the miracles they have witnessed.