Caridad Svich

Caridad Svich

Caridad Svich is a playwright-poet, screenwriter, lyricist, editor, translator, essayist and educator. She is also Co-Artistic Director at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in New York City. They are a 2024 Guggenheim Foundation Fellow in Creative Arts- Drama and Performance Art. They also received the 2023 Flora Roberts Award from The Dramatists Guild, and a 2012 Obie for Lifetime Achievement.

Their...
Caridad Svich is a playwright-poet, screenwriter, lyricist, editor, translator, essayist and educator. She is also Co-Artistic Director at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in New York City. They are a 2024 Guggenheim Foundation Fellow in Creative Arts- Drama and Performance Art. They also received the 2023 Flora Roberts Award from The Dramatists Guild, and a 2012 Obie for Lifetime Achievement.

Their first feature film, as co-screenwriter, FUGITIVE DREAMS, is streaming on demand on Apple Tv, Amazon Prime and more. It is based on her play. It received its world premiere at the 2020 Fantasia Film Festival in Montreal, US premiere at the 2020 Austin Film Festival, European premiere at the 2020 Tallinn Black Nights Festival, and subsequently at the 2021 Manchester Film Festival, 2021 Maryland Film Festival, 2021 Cinequest Fest and 2022 NYC Indie Theatre Film Festival. It was named One of the TOP TEN Festival Films of 2020 by The Austin Chronicle.

Signature works include ANY PLACE BUT HERE, 12 OPHELIAS, IPHIGENIA CRASH LAND FALLS..., ALCHEMY OF DESIRE/DEAD-MAN'S BLUES (Rosenthal New Play Prize), RED BIKE (NNPN Rolling World Premiere), GUAPA (NNPN Rolling World Premiere, and Edgerton Foundation New Play Award), SPARK ( National Latine Playwriting Award), MAGNIFICENT WASTE (National Latine Playwriting Award) and THE HOUSE OF THE SPIRITS, based on Isabel Allende's novel (ATCA Primus Prize).

Her second independent feature film ABILENE (as sole screenwriter, based on her play) has been an official selection at various international independent feature film festivals.

Recent theatrical and transmedia world premieres: THE BOOK OF MAGDALENE at Main Street Theater Houston; THEATRE: A LOVE STORY at Know Theatre Cincinnati; THE HOUSE ON THE LAGOON at GALA Hispanic Theatre in D.C.; EVA LUNA at Repertorio Espanol/NY; USHUAIA BLUE at the Contemporary American Theatre Festival; LIFE JACKET at 4615 Theatre in Maryland, MEMORIES OF OVERDEVELOPMENT at Firehouse Theatre in Virginia.

She has received a Tanne Foundation Award, as well as the Ellen Stewart Award for Career Achievement in Professional Theatre from ATHE. They have twice won the National Latino Playwriting Award, for their plays SPARK and MAGNIFICENT WASTE. She is also a theatrical translator, chiefly known for English-language translations of the plays of Federico Garcia Lorca. Her plays have been seen across the US and abroad at diverse venues, among them Denver Center Theatre, Mixed Blood Theatre, San Diego Repertory Theatre, 59E59, The Women's Project, GALA Hispanic Theatre, Milagro Theatre Group, Borderlands, Cervantes Theatre (London), Imago Theatre (Montreal), Teatro Mori (Chile), Artheater (Cologne), Ilkhom Theatre (Uzbekistan), and Edinburgh Fringe Festival. She has adapted for the stage novels by Isabel Allende, Julia Alvarez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Jose Leon Sanchez, and Rosario Ferre. They sustain a parallel career as a lyricist, editor, freelance arts journalist, educator and artivist. Their works are published by TCG, Smith & Kraus, Broadway Play Publishing, Intellect UK, Manchester University Press, Eyecorner Press, Seagull Books, StageReads, and more.

She has edited & authored several books on theatre and performance, among them TOWARD A FUTURE THEATRE (Bloomsbury/Methuen Drama), Mitchell & Trask's HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH (4th Wall Series , Routledge). She is alumna playwright of New Dramatists, Associate Editor of Contemporary Theatre Review for Routledge UK, Drama Editor of Asymptote literary journal, contributing editor of TheatreForum, founder of NoPassport theatre alliance and press, and serves on the advisory board of Global Performance Studies journal. She holds an MFA from UCSD, and also trained for four consecutive years with Maria Irene Fornes at the legendary INTAR Hispanic Playwrights In Residence Laboratory. She is a former Harvard/Radcliffe Institute Fellow and TCG/PEW and TCG.NEA Fellow. Her archives are housed at the University of Miami Cuban Heritage Collection in Florida, and partially at Ohio State University's Lawrence & Lee Theatre Collection.

Plays

  • RED BIKE by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 28
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–4
    ·
    Genre: comedy, movement/physical + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: coming of age, for all ages.
    Genre: comedy, movement/physical, political, young audiences
    Keyword: coming of age, for all ages.
    Named BEST Onstage Pre Pandemic Show of the Year (2020) in San Diego Union Tribune.
    Named One of the BEST Theater Shows of 2020 in The Times of San Diego.
    2018-2019 NNPN Rolling World Premiere.

    Starting June 8, 2021 for script and theatrical/digital rights contact: trwplays@theatricalrights.com


    What kind of future will you have living in these here United...
    Named BEST Onstage Pre Pandemic Show of the Year (2020) in San Diego Union Tribune.
    Named One of the BEST Theater Shows of 2020 in The Times of San Diego.
    2018-2019 NNPN Rolling World Premiere.

    Starting June 8, 2021 for script and theatrical/digital rights contact: trwplays@theatricalrights.com


    What kind of future will you have living in these here United States? Remember when you were eleven years old and you had a bike, one that made you dream about a world bigger than the one in which you live? This is that memory. Except it is now. A play for one performer (two or three). This is the first play in the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle. ... "Svich's RED BIKE is s luminous piece that tackles our common dreams and dangers with magic, poetry, and a sense of both possibility and loneliness. A beautiful work!" -- Cristina Garcia (novelist, Dreaming in Cuban)

    "In RED BIKE, Svich sees poetry in the everyday, passion in politics, power in citizenship. In this play-monologue told from the perspective of pre adolescent exploring a world in distress (closed businesses, poverty on the street), Svich channels Carson McCullers' Frankie in A MEMBER OF THE WEDDING -- our unnamed protagonist observes astutely, accepts the parameters of their world, feels the possibilities of dreams. The bike is transportation and a dream mobile moving from one viewpoint to another, like a magic carpet. "Somebody gotta make red bikes somewhere," they muse, "so kids like me can dream." This dreamscape is haunting and gorgeous." -- Martha Wade Steketee, freelance critic and dramaturg

  • BICICLETA ROJA (RED BIKE) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: Spanish, for all ages + 3 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: Spanish, for all ages, childhood memories, Kids sports, coming of age
    Spanish version by Caridad Svich of her play RED BIKE.

    derechos: trwplays@theatricalrights.com

    Tienes 11 anos de edad. Tienes un bicicleta roja. Un dia sales a dar una vuelta, y todo cambia.
  • 12 OPHELIAS (a play with broken songs) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    10–12
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, drama + 4 more
    ·
    Keyword: based on Shakespearean characters, play with songs + 2 more
    Genre: adaptation, drama, experimental, movement/physical, musical, verse
    Keyword: based on Shakespearean characters, play with songs, feminism, lgbtqia
    Full-length in one-act. text, lyrics and music by Caridad Svich.
    for performance rights contact: trwplays@theatricalrights.com

    Shakespeare's Ophelia rises out of the water dreaming of Pop-Tarts and other sweet things. She finds herself in a neo-Elizabethan Appalachian setting where Gertrude runs a brothel, Hamlet is called Rude Boy, and nothing is what it seems. In this mirrored world...
    Full-length in one-act. text, lyrics and music by Caridad Svich.
    for performance rights contact: trwplays@theatricalrights.com

    Shakespeare's Ophelia rises out of the water dreaming of Pop-Tarts and other sweet things. She finds herself in a neo-Elizabethan Appalachian setting where Gertrude runs a brothel, Hamlet is called Rude Boy, and nothing is what it seems. In this mirrored world of word-craps and cold sex, Ophelia cuts a new path for herself.
  • An Acorn by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 3
    ·
    Cast: 
    5–7
    ·
    Genre: drama, experimental + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: climate change, Politics + 2 more
    Genre: drama, experimental, movement/physical, political
    Keyword: climate change, Politics, social conscience, citizenship
    Propelled by the threat of environmental catastrophe, one traveler leaves home in search of their voice, lost in the rubble of a battered world. This journey takes us through the wreckage of time and history in pursuit of the memory of what earth once was... Haunting, surprising, and poignant: in the face of irreversible environmental damage, AN ACORN uncovers a small kernel of hope. Originally commissioned by...
    Propelled by the threat of environmental catastrophe, one traveler leaves home in search of their voice, lost in the rubble of a battered world. This journey takes us through the wreckage of time and history in pursuit of the memory of what earth once was... Haunting, surprising, and poignant: in the face of irreversible environmental damage, AN ACORN uncovers a small kernel of hope. Originally commissioned by the American Blues Theater in Chicago.

  • AGUA DE LUNA (psalms for the rouge) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    8
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: Immigrants, Latinx + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: Immigrants, Latinx, poetry
    Three households are viewed in close-up snapshots through the eyes of a bird-dog creature and a woman of 108 years in this story of faith, redemption, ache, loss and hunger set in southwest Detroit.
  • Albemarle by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 7
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–4
    ·
    Genre: comedy, drama + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: magic, dramedy + 4 more
    Genre: comedy, drama, movement/physical
    Keyword: magic, dramedy, coming of age, small-town life, climate change, capitalism and late Capitalism
    2021 Finalist Blue Ink Playwriting Award, American Blues Theater, Chicago.

    a sequel (of sorts) to RED BIKE. may be performed as audio, digital or live drama.
    the Odyssey of the Other(ed). a dark night of the soul. a reckoning.

    I lives in Mine's house in a town in the edge-lands. I Misses You, but won't tell anyone. It's Sunday. And last night was a drunken...
    2021 Finalist Blue Ink Playwriting Award, American Blues Theater, Chicago.

    a sequel (of sorts) to RED BIKE. may be performed as audio, digital or live drama.
    the Odyssey of the Other(ed). a dark night of the soul. a reckoning.

    I lives in Mine's house in a town in the edge-lands. I Misses You, but won't tell anyone. It's Sunday. And last night was a drunken night. This night is going to be the same, but different, on account of a badger and a mysterious opera palace and some other things. How do we come of age when we come of age? How do we live in a movie when we're IRL?

    ABOUT THE PLAY: A comic piece with darkish overtones that may be played by one to four actors (or more) that invites choreographic staging, musical underscoring, and an expressive lightness in its playing. Its focus is on class dynamics, inequality, and search for spiritual grace. It paints a portrait of a town called Albemarle in the edgelands, and a figure named I (ideally played by female or non-binary actor) that is on the cusp of finding themselves after a prolonged period of mourning someone they loved. In the play, in a picaresque manner, we follow I as they encounter Mine's, their guardian, their Friend, a Squatter, a Badger and a Cleaner on a long night as the one they love and lost haunts their imagination. Each encounter is a step toward potential transformation and redemption. Written in ardent yet plain-spoken poetic prose, the piece is an intimate yet epic personal soul ride that casts a wide, long view on subjects of climate grief and change, late capitalism, and hope in the body politic.
  • Alchemy of Desire/Dead-Man's Blues (a play with songs) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: death and grief, community + 2 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: death and grief, community, healing, ritual
    Grief. Longing. Community.

    A young woman loses her husband to a war. A community of women are left behind. In a burn-out bayou, the ghost of a love haunts the living. A poetic drama.
  • AMY AND SPECK by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    3–8
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: American politics, Reproductive Rights + 5 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, political, satire
    Keyword: American politics, Reproductive Rights, American justice system, whiteness, girl boss, American fascism, capitalism and late Capitalism
    Amy Coney Barrett, theocracy, facism, the Koch Brothers, whiteness and American necro-politics in the 21st century.

    AMY AND SPECK is a play-installation and fantasia. It looks at an encounter between a judge who serves on the highest court in the land and the various spectres that haunt and govern them. A portrait of the rise of theocratic neoliberal necro-politics in the USA vs. the autonomy...
    Amy Coney Barrett, theocracy, facism, the Koch Brothers, whiteness and American necro-politics in the 21st century.

    AMY AND SPECK is a play-installation and fantasia. It looks at an encounter between a judge who serves on the highest court in the land and the various spectres that haunt and govern them. A portrait of the rise of theocratic neoliberal necro-politics in the USA vs. the autonomy of subjugated people. This piece is loosely inspired by real life, and may be played as in person, digital, audio, film, dance, lip-sync and/or hybrid theatre.

    This play is the second panel of a diptych, whose first panel play is CHELSEA & IVANKA.
  • Arbor Falls by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 9
    ·
    Cast: 
    7
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: spirituality, small town America + 4 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: spirituality, small town America, Politics, liberalism, Trump, racism
    Finalist for 2020 American Blues Theater Blue Ink Playwriting Award.
    Finalist for 2019 National Playwrights Conference (O'Neill Theater Center).


    In a small town called Arbor Falls, a preacher wrestles with their faith as they try to hold onto the last vestiges of a church with barely a congregation to call its own. Into this town arrives a traveler whose presence exposes the...
    Finalist for 2020 American Blues Theater Blue Ink Playwriting Award.
    Finalist for 2019 National Playwrights Conference (O'Neill Theater Center).


    In a small town called Arbor Falls, a preacher wrestles with their faith as they try to hold onto the last vestiges of a church with barely a congregation to call its own. Into this town arrives a traveler whose presence exposes the spiritual and moral values upon which it stands. ARBOR FALLS is part of the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle that began with RED BIKE.
  • Archipelago by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 3
    ·
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: love story, cultural identity + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: love story, cultural identity, globalization
    Published by Next Stage Press.
    Premiered at Lighthouse Poole Centre for the Arts in England.
    US premiere at Son of Semele Ensemble, Los Angeles.

    A love story. A memory play. A dream play. One person meets another across borders and languages, across time and space. A day in a lifetime.

    This script premiered at Lighthouse Poole Centre for the Arts in England under...
    Published by Next Stage Press.
    Premiered at Lighthouse Poole Centre for the Arts in England.
    US premiere at Son of Semele Ensemble, Los Angeles.

    A love story. A memory play. A dream play. One person meets another across borders and languages, across time and space. A day in a lifetime.

    This script premiered at Lighthouse Poole Centre for the Arts in England under Stephen Wrentmore's direction with film by Desperate Optimists.
  • Baby Steps by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 4
    ·
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama, political
    ·
    Keyword: Latinx experience, urban gentrification
    Genre: drama, political
    Keyword: Latinx experience, urban gentrification
    In a waiting room or park bench in Hell's Kitchen, NYC, Arroyo and Charlie meet. A story about language, identity, the small panics and joys of life, gentrification, and the beauty of a random human encounter.
  • BETTER MAYBE by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–10
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: healing, aftermath
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: healing, aftermath
    how to make sense of the world when it feels as if it's all over? a shared experience offering hope.
    originally commissioned by The Fornes Institute for Play at Home, 2020.
  • BLAZE by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    7–10
    ·
    Genre: drama, political + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: police brutality, environmental racism + 1 more
    Genre: drama, political, verse
    Keyword: police brutality, environmental racism, Black and brown lives. Uprising
    Semifinalist for 2020 Shakespeare's New Contemporaries.

    BLAZE (or the tale of Sister Night and Brother Day in Titus land) is about living at the edge of water beset by trouble and seeking change. It tells the story of one Sister Night and Brother Day and their people as they are hunted by forces of oppression, and damage is done to their town; but damage will not be let. uprising days will...
    Semifinalist for 2020 Shakespeare's New Contemporaries.

    BLAZE (or the tale of Sister Night and Brother Day in Titus land) is about living at the edge of water beset by trouble and seeking change. It tells the story of one Sister Night and Brother Day and their people as they are hunted by forces of oppression, and damage is done to their town; but damage will not be let. uprising days will begin and after, there will an awakening. BLAZE is part play, part unplugged opera, part spoken word jam, part protest and a healing thing too. Freely inspired by Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus and its polluted world, in more ways than one.
  • Blue by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 6
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–2
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: swimming, poetic language
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: swimming, poetic language
    This piece was first seen at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe's 2021 Online Theatre Festival.

    A marathon swimmer is in the middle of the ocean, and in the middle of a personal crisis. Wrestling with themselves and their past. Looking to the future. A short play for one, two or more voices.
  • The Book of Magdalene by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 3
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: contemporary drama, queer + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: contemporary drama, queer, feminism
    2022 TheatreLive Online Film Festival Winner-Best Experimental Feature Theatre Project (Film or Video)
    2022 Top 10 IMDB Nominee for Best Filmed Theatre, Lonely Wolf Festival, London, UK.
    2021 world digital premiere, Main Street Theater, Houston.
    Official Selection: 2021 The Theatre Times International Online Theatre Festival.
    Nominated for the 2021 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize....
    2022 TheatreLive Online Film Festival Winner-Best Experimental Feature Theatre Project (Film or Video)
    2022 Top 10 IMDB Nominee for Best Filmed Theatre, Lonely Wolf Festival, London, UK.
    2021 world digital premiere, Main Street Theater, Houston.
    Official Selection: 2021 The Theatre Times International Online Theatre Festival.
    Nominated for the 2021 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.

    New York Times review excerpt February 2021: "Spare and immediate new drama" THE BOOK OF MAGDALENE. New York Times review February 15, 2021: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/15/theater/review-book-of-magdalene-hotel-good-luck.html?smid=em-share

    In the edge-lands, in weird times, it's nite-time until it's not. These nites: Magdalene misses Ru and who they could have been together, Magdalene cares for Elder, Magdalene visits the local church to look at the sky, Magdalene works the call lines of the lonely and encounters Suit. Call this a quest. Call this a life waiting to be born again, haunted by a past when another Magdalene lived and was misunderstood. A contemporary drama of sharp encounters, winding faith, tough love and tenderness suffused with grace and magic. A story about finding the courage to move on when life feels as if it is stuck in place. A cross-roads play.

  • The Breath of Stars by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    8–15
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, experimental + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: Shakespeare, Fantasy + 1 more
    Genre: adaptation, experimental, fantasy
    Keyword: Shakespeare, Fantasy, poetry
    THE BREATH OF STARS is a drama that looks at the workings of memory itself through stories of love and loss in the contemporary world. Shot through the lens of Shakespeare’s The Tempest reconfigured for the digital age, we see an Ariel that mourns Prospero, and a Caliban who walks through the desert. A play about the spinning globe, a lost city of strings, electric dreams, and finding a lover again in the body of a stranger.
  • The Brick by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–10
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: the origin of everything, capitalism and late Capitalism + 6 more
    Genre: dark comedy, drama, political
    Keyword: the origin of everything, capitalism and late Capitalism, Politics, fascism, Economics, neoliberalism, archive, climate catastrophe
    "A long time ago a group of men sat in a room.
    They created a document that would change the world forever.

    This document was called The Brick.

    This is their story, even if they will not always appear in it.,
    because you could say their story became a version of the world. "

    THE BRICK is an epic fantasia and play/installation. It looks...
    "A long time ago a group of men sat in a room.
    They created a document that would change the world forever.

    This document was called The Brick.

    This is their story, even if they will not always appear in it.,
    because you could say their story became a version of the world. "

    THE BRICK is an epic fantasia and play/installation. It looks at the world at its breaking point.
  • CHELSEA & IVANKA by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 4
    ·
    Cast: 
    2–4
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, political + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: American society and politics, whiteness + 2 more
    Genre: dark comedy, political, satire
    Keyword: American society and politics, whiteness, capitalism and late Capitalism, encroaching fascism
    Nominated for the 2023 L. Arnold Weissberger New Play Award.
    Finalist, 2023 Bay Area Playwrights Festival.
    Semi-Finalist, 2023 National Playwrights Conference, Eugene O'Neill Theater Center.

    Chelsea Clinton & Ivanka Kushner. Two daughters. Two political parties joined at the hip.

    Chelsea & Ivanka is a play-installation. It looks at the friendship and...
    Nominated for the 2023 L. Arnold Weissberger New Play Award.
    Finalist, 2023 Bay Area Playwrights Festival.
    Semi-Finalist, 2023 National Playwrights Conference, Eugene O'Neill Theater Center.

    Chelsea Clinton & Ivanka Kushner. Two daughters. Two political parties joined at the hip.

    Chelsea & Ivanka is a play-installation. It looks at the friendship and falling out of two adults that sometimes resemble the famous people that bear their names, or what happens when neoliberal capitalism and consumerist fascism meet. This piece is loosely inspired by real life.

    It may be played as a live, audio, digital, film, dance, and/or hybrid theatre.

  • Clara Thomas Bailey by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 7
    ·
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: the origin of everything, capitalism and late Capitalism + 3 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: the origin of everything, capitalism and late Capitalism, loneliness, Mental Health, heartbreak
    2023 excerpt from the play published in The New England Review (44.3)
    2022 Semi-Finalist, Blue Ink Award, American Blues Theater.
    Nominated for the 2021 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.
    2021 Finalist for the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference.

    Hi. My name is Clara. My name is Thomas. My name is Bailey. This is my/Ur/our story. This is a portrait in motion. A day in a...
    2023 excerpt from the play published in The New England Review (44.3)
    2022 Semi-Finalist, Blue Ink Award, American Blues Theater.
    Nominated for the 2021 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.
    2021 Finalist for the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference.

    Hi. My name is Clara. My name is Thomas. My name is Bailey. This is my/Ur/our story. This is a portrait in motion. A day in a life. A life in an hour. When the world's on fire. When our hearts are rent. When our bodies may be failing us. When we look at the sky and the birds too to figure out a way through again.
  • Corazon Eterno (always in my heart) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: romantic comedy
    ·
    Keyword: fractured love story
    Genre: romantic comedy
    Keyword: fractured love story
    Prior script version premiered at Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis.
    Current script version work-shopped at Rep Theatre St. Louis' Ignite Festival

    CORAZON ETERNO is a poetic, romantic play of love ignited, denied, rekindled, rejected, and renewed; of love pragmatic and impossible, temporal and eternal; and ultimately of love to transform the human experience. When Julia meets Julia,...
    Prior script version premiered at Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis.
    Current script version work-shopped at Rep Theatre St. Louis' Ignite Festival

    CORAZON ETERNO is a poetic, romantic play of love ignited, denied, rekindled, rejected, and renewed; of love pragmatic and impossible, temporal and eternal; and ultimately of love to transform the human experience. When Julia meets Julia, sparks fly, but the course of love is not always smooth. A story about a love that transcends time.
  • Day for Night (fifteen tracks for disaster) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–5
    ·
    Genre: drama, verse
    ·
    Keyword: environment, spoken word performance
    Genre: drama, verse
    Keyword: environment, spoken word performance
    DAY FOR NIGHT is conceived as a vinyl recording for the stage. fifteen tracks of hope, despair, longing, and prayer. The world of this piece is both IRL and in the digital realm, cos most of us on the planet are cyborgs and have been for some time. This world, in part, is marked by climate grief, environmental racism, capitalism, post-human-ness, queerness, wildness, ritual, music and activism.
  • Desdemona's Child (blood cry) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 4
    ·
    Cast: 
    7–10
    ·
    Genre: drama, political
    ·
    Keyword: racism, classical contemporary + 2 more
    Genre: drama, political
    Keyword: racism, classical contemporary, police brutality, Black and brown lives. Uprising
    2019 Shortlisted for Shakespeare's New Contemporaries (American Shakespeare Center).

    We know them by different names, but we remember their stories all the same. Fierce O, gone, loved too much. Beautiful D, haunting, loved against themselves. Bitter I, stuck, doesn't taste love. D child knows them by these names, but doesn't remember the story pumping through their own blood....
    2019 Shortlisted for Shakespeare's New Contemporaries (American Shakespeare Center).

    We know them by different names, but we remember their stories all the same. Fierce O, gone, loved too much. Beautiful D, haunting, loved against themselves. Bitter I, stuck, doesn't taste love. D child knows them by these names, but doesn't remember the story pumping through their own blood. Desdemona's Child (blood cry) dives into the ruin Othello left behind and the next generation struggling to keep afloat. Navigating a sunken past amidst a drowning present, D child seeks to reconcile truth with memory.

    Desdemona's Child (blood cry) exists in the eye of the storm, or our bated breath as we wait for the flood to wash over and drown us too. Desdemona's Child (blood cry) asks of us the same questions D child asks of themselves: How do we survive histories built on oppression? How do we contend with legacies we're born into? How do we begin to heal when trauma's inked into our being?

    *Desdemona’s child comes back to the town in which they were raised, haunted by the ghost of Beautiful D, and with a desire to come to terms with trauma from their past. In this town, trouble rages, as a climate of hate threatens to overtake all. A flood and a whole lotta honest witnessing may start to turn the tide of human darkness. This play is set in modern-day US, freely inspired by and set in the wake of Shakespeare's OTHELLO.
  • De Troya by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: drama, experimental + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: Immigrants, mythology + 1 more
    Genre: drama, experimental, fantasy
    Keyword: Immigrants, mythology, poetry
    Premiered at Cara Mia Theatre, Dallas, Texas.

    DE TROYA is a cracked fairy tale, a ghost story, a border ballad, and graphic novel for the stage. In DE TROYA, a mysteriously wounded girl washes on shore and meets young Mara on the riverbank. Worried sisters Lupe and Lena wonder if tonight is the night that their niece will disappear without a trace? Boiling under the surface of a violent city, two...
    Premiered at Cara Mia Theatre, Dallas, Texas.

    DE TROYA is a cracked fairy tale, a ghost story, a border ballad, and graphic novel for the stage. In DE TROYA, a mysteriously wounded girl washes on shore and meets young Mara on the riverbank. Worried sisters Lupe and Lena wonder if tonight is the night that their niece will disappear without a trace? Boiling under the surface of a violent city, two families wrestle with rebellion, regret, and loss of faith. DE TROYA is a beautifully mythical story about how the weight of our memories can create an insatiable longing for salvation.
  • Eva Luna (based on Isabel Allende's novel) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    7–16
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, comedy + 3 more
    ·
    Keyword: romantic comedy, coming of age + 3 more
    Genre: adaptation, comedy, period, political, romantic comedy
    Keyword: romantic comedy, coming of age, Latin America, Politics, feminism
    2023 Talia Award nominee (Spain) for Best New Play/Production in NYC by US Latine Playwright.
    2023 Premio LATA for Distinguished Achievement in the art of Theatrical Adaptation.
    2020 The Kilroys List.
    Commissioned by and premiere at Repertorio Espanol. 2022.

    Isabel Allende's novel is re-imagined for the stage. This play tells the coming-of-age story of EVA LUNA, a woman...
    2023 Talia Award nominee (Spain) for Best New Play/Production in NYC by US Latine Playwright.
    2023 Premio LATA for Distinguished Achievement in the art of Theatrical Adaptation.
    2020 The Kilroys List.
    Commissioned by and premiere at Repertorio Espanol. 2022.

    Isabel Allende's novel is re-imagined for the stage. This play tells the coming-of-age story of EVA LUNA, a woman born into poverty who rises up through the world to find her voice as a storyteller and a reflector of history. Enchanting, comical, and sly, EVA LUNA follows the character's journey from childhood to adulthood, and along the way allows us to meet an array of characters that will change the course of Eva's life forever.
  • for the love of the game by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: comedy, romantic comedy
    ·
    Keyword: gender, identity + 5 more
    Genre: comedy, romantic comedy
    Keyword: gender, identity, Race, sports, class, romantic comedy, America's middle class
    A comedy, of sorts, about life, love, class divides, gender, identity, race, the body politic and the heart of creativity.
    JB plays golf. They’re good at it. It’s summer and their old friend Shep comes to visit. Into the world of sports also walks in an upstart named Ren. Let’s just say it’s not going to be like any summer JB has gone through before.
    This play consciously evokes the tone and...
    A comedy, of sorts, about life, love, class divides, gender, identity, race, the body politic and the heart of creativity.
    JB plays golf. They’re good at it. It’s summer and their old friend Shep comes to visit. Into the world of sports also walks in an upstart named Ren. Let’s just say it’s not going to be like any summer JB has gone through before.
    This play consciously evokes the tone and style of old Hollywood romantic comedies by George Cukor and Ernst Lubitsch. No need of a heavy hand in the playing of it. Enough to tip the hat to this kind of style. But attention need be paid to the rhythms, which are quicksilver and ardent. No emo. Please.
    While the stage directions are grounded mostly in photo-realism, I encourage the playing to be light on its feet, playful, imaginative & abstract.
  • FUEL by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 7
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: drama, fable/folktale + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: southern gothic, music
    Genre: drama, fable/folktale, movement/physical, political
    Keyword: southern gothic, music
    You live in a place that reeks of gasoline. You run on fuel. You don’t know anything else exceptliving hard and surviving, but one day that fuel is gonna run out. How are you gonna know who you are, then? This is the story of Baby and their people living in a town left for dead. This is also the ballad of Baby and Girl. In this here mad America. This play is the 2nd piece in the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle...
    You live in a place that reeks of gasoline. You run on fuel. You don’t know anything else exceptliving hard and surviving, but one day that fuel is gonna run out. How are you gonna know who you are, then? This is the story of Baby and their people living in a town left for dead. This is also the ballad of Baby and Girl. In this here mad America. This play is the 2nd piece in the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle that began with RED BIKE.

  • Future Emergencies by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: capitalism and late Capitalism, state of politics + 5 more
    Genre: comedy, dark comedy, drama, political
    Keyword: capitalism and late Capitalism, state of politics, Dystopia, sci-fi, everyday horror, Middle class life--meaning of life, climate catastrophe
    A story of three dinners. Two friends. One stranger. And a world out of joint. A play about times of emergency and states of emergence. A dark tragicomedy about late capitalism, precarity, and the fury of birds.

    This play may be played as an audio, digital, film, hybrid or in person experience.
  • GERTIE AND ALICE BY THE SEA (you are to me) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: poetry, feminism + 8 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: poetry, feminism, modernism, art, Painting, Lesbian, aging, cognitive decline, dementia, caregiving
    In the last house in the world, two women live out their days. They could be the famous Gertie and Alice, but they are not necessarily. They still do the things we do--eating, talking, laughing with friends and lovers—until what they know begins to slip away, and all that is left is desire.
  • GUAPA by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 5
    ·
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: comedy, drama
    ·
    Keyword: Latino
    Genre: comedy, drama
    Keyword: Latino
    2012-2013 NNPN Rolling World Premiere.
    2012 Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.

    In Caridad Svich's play Guapa: Single-mom Roly lives in a dusty Texas town that everyone longs to escape. She's never seen anything like Guapa, a natural-born athlete with a fiery ambition to become an international soccer star. When Guapa joins Roly's family, everyone's life is turned...
    2012-2013 NNPN Rolling World Premiere.
    2012 Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.

    In Caridad Svich's play Guapa: Single-mom Roly lives in a dusty Texas town that everyone longs to escape. She's never seen anything like Guapa, a natural-born athlete with a fiery ambition to become an international soccer star. When Guapa joins Roly's family, everyone's life is turned upside down. With only one shot to reach the big leagues from the barrio, how can Guapa convince the non-believers to let go of their doubts, spread their wings and fly? This play received an Nnpn rolling world premiere at Borderlands Theater, Phoenix Theatre and Miracle Theatre Group, and a 2012 Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.

    A poetic realistic comedy originally premiered as an NNPN Continued Life Fund rolling world premiere at Borderlands Theater, Phoenix Theatre and Miracle Theatre Group. The play was a finaiist for the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference.
  • HIDE SKY by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    3
    ·
    Genre: drama
    Genre: drama
    In Hide Sky, a mother’s passing forces an estranged sibling to return home to the Florida Panhandle to an older brother and sister whom she once left behind, and to unresolved matters of love and faith. A drama about coming through grief, the lies we tell each other in the name of “family and religion” and how we can all perhaps begin again.
  • Holler River by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 4
    ·
    Cast: 
    6–10
    ·
    Genre: drama, political
    ·
    Keyword: family, Shakespeare + 4 more
    Genre: drama, political
    Keyword: family, Shakespeare, soldier with PTSD, vet with PTSD, veteran homecoming, community
    2018 Finalist for Shakespeare's New Contemporaries, American Shakespeare Center.

    In this mythic reflection of a scorched nation, a soldier waits for another to come home. They were teacher and student once. A town waits, too, deep in the heart of coal country, while the one who roams wrestles with what home even means. In this powerful ritual and psalm we journey through the stories we tell...
    2018 Finalist for Shakespeare's New Contemporaries, American Shakespeare Center.

    In this mythic reflection of a scorched nation, a soldier waits for another to come home. They were teacher and student once. A town waits, too, deep in the heart of coal country, while the one who roams wrestles with what home even means. In this powerful ritual and psalm we journey through the stories we tell ourselves to ensure we exist, the songs we sing to get by, and the maps we make of the memory of our warring lives.

    This play is part of the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle interrogating local and national identities, and it is also a potent reflection on Shakespeare's HENRY IV Part One.
  • The Hour of All Things by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    1
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: dramatic monologue, capitalism and late Capitalism + 2 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: dramatic monologue, capitalism and late Capitalism, American political protest, America's middle class
    One day you find yourself crying in queue at the supermarket. The weight of capitalism bears down upon you. You try to fight it off as you buy your non-GMO rice and pumpkin seeds. But the weight is inescapable. You remember marching in the streets, protesting with belief and passion that justice would be met. You decide to march again. This time things will be better. They must be. But there's the police...
    One day you find yourself crying in queue at the supermarket. The weight of capitalism bears down upon you. You try to fight it off as you buy your non-GMO rice and pumpkin seeds. But the weight is inescapable. You remember marching in the streets, protesting with belief and passion that justice would be met. You decide to march again. This time things will be better. They must be. But there's the police to contend with, and tear gas, and a devastating feeling in the pit of your stomach that power may not belong to the people. You meet a bird from another time - the future? - you listen to their story. You find your way.
  • HOW IT ENDS by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    1–5
    ·
    Genre: immersive, political
    ·
    Keyword: interactive, climate crisis + 5 more
    Genre: immersive, political
    Keyword: interactive, climate crisis, storytelling, magic, myth, theatre, contemporary.
    In order for a play to begin, the script must be activated.
    But what is a script in a climate in crisis?
    In this piece for performance, you will be asked to step into the roles of people that are part of the world's story as they try to survive.

    A play for one actor and four audience players.
  • Human Interest Story by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    1
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: Survival, climate change + 2 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: Survival, climate change, neoliberalism, magical realism
    Meet RK. Here. In this place shared by you and I.
    RK would like to share a story with you about some things that happened once.
    Perhaps some of this story will be familiar to some of you.

    This story is about a year in a life. A marking of time. Who are we in a broken world? How do we survive? This one-actor piece explores the radical nature of vulnerability during shocking times....
    Meet RK. Here. In this place shared by you and I.
    RK would like to share a story with you about some things that happened once.
    Perhaps some of this story will be familiar to some of you.

    This story is about a year in a life. A marking of time. Who are we in a broken world? How do we survive? This one-actor piece explores the radical nature of vulnerability during shocking times.

    A tour-de-force play for a performer.
    May be performed as an audio, IRL, digital/film or hybrid piece.

    This play is the second play in the FUTURE EMERGENCIES trilogy.
  • Hurt Song by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 4
    ·
    Cast: 
    5–6
    ·
    Genre: drama, movement/physical + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: Dispossession, working class + 2 more
    Genre: drama, movement/physical, political
    Keyword: Dispossession, working class, American political protest, climate refugees
    2020 Finalist for Kitchen Dog Theater New Works Festival.

    You pick through trash, you are trash, says someone. How do you find your worth in a land that tells you otherwise? This is the ballad of the hurting kind – those displaced from their homes, looking for work and sent to places in the middle of the country to make their way. Call it a story about climate refugees. Or we can just call this a...
    2020 Finalist for Kitchen Dog Theater New Works Festival.

    You pick through trash, you are trash, says someone. How do you find your worth in a land that tells you otherwise? This is the ballad of the hurting kind – those displaced from their homes, looking for work and sent to places in the middle of the country to make their way. Call it a story about climate refugees. Or we can just call this a fable for dark times. This is the third play in the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle that began with RED BIKE.
  • JARMAN (all this maddening beauty) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    1–6
    ·
    Genre: drama, experimental + 1 more
    Genre: drama, experimental, movement/physical
    A provocative and loving exploration of the queer art legacy of British filmmaker and visual artist Derek Jarman.
  • Joan of the Dockyards by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: drama, Women's lives. Working class women.
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: drama, Women's lives. Working class women.
    2023 Semi-Finalist, Blue Ink Award, American Blues Theater.

    Meet Joan. She works in a factory. So does her older sibling. They live in a town by the water. They are both trying to change the world in their own way. Meet Char(lie), Joan's bestie and sometime lover. Char is a nurse. They care for the sick and wonder too what, if anything, is possible beyond the edges of this town. A poetic...
    2023 Semi-Finalist, Blue Ink Award, American Blues Theater.

    Meet Joan. She works in a factory. So does her older sibling. They live in a town by the water. They are both trying to change the world in their own way. Meet Char(lie), Joan's bestie and sometime lover. Char is a nurse. They care for the sick and wonder too what, if anything, is possible beyond the edges of this town. A poetic drama about a Joan that is an everyday saint in a bruised and battered world. A story of finding your path and taking a leap of faith.
  • Juliet in Time by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    5–7
    ·
    Genre: comedy, drama + 4 more
    ·
    Keyword: based on Shakespearean characters, climate + 3 more
    Genre: comedy, drama, fantasy, movement/physical, musical, verse
    Keyword: based on Shakespearean characters, climate, gender queer, blooming romance, ecofeminism
    JULIET IN TIME
    is a pastoral, lyrical dramedy set in a life after Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet. It is a piece in conversation with stories of empire, an exploration of emergence from climate collapse, a queer romance, and a theatrical fantasy on themes of love and chance, desire and potentiality. This is also a play with songs.
  • JONAS (the future we remember) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: coming of age, environment
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: coming of age, environment
    Remember that time when we thought we knew things? Remember how the world was gonna last forever? A play about who we were once, and who we became. Meet Jonas and Cindy. They are best friends. Meet Ally and Stef and Cam. They’re in their lives, too. And so is a tree, and so is a balloon, and maybe a song, too. In the first half of the play, all of the characters are between the ages of eight and nine.
    In...
    Remember that time when we thought we knew things? Remember how the world was gonna last forever? A play about who we were once, and who we became. Meet Jonas and Cindy. They are best friends. Meet Ally and Stef and Cam. They’re in their lives, too. And so is a tree, and so is a balloon, and maybe a song, too. In the first half of the play, all of the characters are between the ages of eight and nine.
    In the second half of the play, they are adults.*
  • Kora K. by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    4–8
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: drama, creation of identity + 4 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: drama, creation of identity, artmaking, literature, theatre, Academia
    Finalist, 2024 Blue Ink Award, American Blues Theater, Chicago.

    A play that looks at the intersections between truth and fiction, artmaking and fame, identity construction and the creation of story worlds, especially in the theatre. A ghost story about the self or the story of a translator.
  • The Labyrinth of Desire by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    9
    ·
    Genre: comedy, farce + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: full length romantic comedy, LBGTQIA + 2 more
    Genre: comedy, farce, romantic comedy, translation
    Keyword: full length romantic comedy, LBGTQIA, Latine, Latinx
    Florela loves Alejandro. Alejandro is courting Laura. Florela befriends Laura, and falls in love with her, too. But is Florela really Florela or is Florela actually Felipe? Or both? A game of wits in the thorny and complex labyrinth that is desire. A breezy comedy of romance and hijinks adapted/translated from Lope de Vega's play "la prueba de los ingenios." This play originally was commissioned...
    Florela loves Alejandro. Alejandro is courting Laura. Florela befriends Laura, and falls in love with her, too. But is Florela really Florela or is Florela actually Felipe? Or both? A game of wits in the thorny and complex labyrinth that is desire. A breezy comedy of romance and hijinks adapted/translated from Lope de Vega's play "la prueba de los ingenios." This play originally was commissioned by UCSD and staged at Milagro Theatre, and was revised for Fordham Theatre production and has since been newly revised for 2022.
  • The Left by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    1–10
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: ableism, social justice + 5 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: ableism, social justice, late stage capitalism, neoliberalism, loneliness, choral play, glam metal
    THE LEFT is a choral play about some of those left, on the left, when all systems and many people have failed one another. An intimate spoken-word opera for battered times with glam metal traces. A darkly comic drama about survival.

    This play is part of the FUTURE EMERGENCIES trilogy.
  • LIFE JACKET by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    2–4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: Americana, small town + 3 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: Americana, small town, class, friendship, American capitalism
    A story about two friends adrift in the waters of America.

    This is a story about two friends on a boat. They live in a small town near the sea. On this Sunday, they go out, as they have done in the past, but this time, something changes. Call it a spirit encounter. Or maybe they just hit some nasty debris in the water. Whatever the case, it is a day that will test them both.

    ...
    A story about two friends adrift in the waters of America.

    This is a story about two friends on a boat. They live in a small town near the sea. On this Sunday, they go out, as they have done in the past, but this time, something changes. Call it a spirit encounter. Or maybe they just hit some nasty debris in the water. Whatever the case, it is a day that will test them both.

    "I reach for the whiskey
    They grab my arm
    And under that big ash-grey sky
    We start fightin
    Like a coupla kids
    Hell-bent
    on some kinda vengeance."


    This play is part of the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle that began with RED BIKE. It may be performed as an audio, digital or live theatre piece. It should be performed by two or more actors, but casting must be inclusive in all senses and reflective of the world.
  • The Little Hours (volume 2) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    1–2
    ·
    Genre: drama, experimental
    ·
    Keyword: bonds of friendship, digital storytelling + 3 more
    Genre: drama, experimental
    Keyword: bonds of friendship, digital storytelling, memory, 'til death do us part, ghost story
    This is the version - volume 2- of the text that runs between 30 and 50 minutes.

    THE LITTLE HOURS is a play-installation by Caridad Svich about two poet friends as they navigate their lives. An investigation of faith, love, and grace, amidst scattered snapshots of an old artist-bohemian New York that may never return. We wait and dream in the little hours for a radical utopia, even while the...
    This is the version - volume 2- of the text that runs between 30 and 50 minutes.

    THE LITTLE HOURS is a play-installation by Caridad Svich about two poet friends as they navigate their lives. An investigation of faith, love, and grace, amidst scattered snapshots of an old artist-bohemian New York that may never return. We wait and dream in the little hours for a radical utopia, even while the world crumbles.

    The shorter version - volume 1 - of the text was first produced in May 2021 by CultureHub and LaMaMa in association with Theater in Quarantine. Directed by Joshua William Gelb. Choreography by KatieRose McLaughlin. Sound score and music by Kate Marvin. Lyrics by Caridad Svich.

    THE LITTLE HOURS was developed in CultureHub and La MaMa’s Experiments in Digital Storytelling Program, which incubates story-driven artworks that harness digital distribution platforms, expand online audience engagement, and push the boundaries of current artistic forms.




    ‍

    The Little Hours is developed in CultureHub and La MaMa’s Experiments in Digital Storytelling Program, which incubates story-driven artworks that harness digital distribution platforms, expand online audience engagement, and push the boundaries of current artistic forms.

    ‍

  • Lucinda Caval by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: drama, Latinx + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: drama, Latinx, Politics
    Lucinda's brother disappears. In a corrupt dictatorship, she searches to find him.
  • Lunch Break by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: interactive, telephone play
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: interactive, telephone play
    An interactive telephone play written for one caller and one listener/respondent that is an elder/senior. A conversation about the random grace that occurs in urban centres sometimes. A memory play in the moment.
    Originally commissioned by 24/6: Jewish Theater.
  • Memories of Overdevelopment by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 8
    ·
    Cast: 
    2–8
    ·
    Genre: docudrama/historic, drama + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: capitalism, testimony + 6 more
    Genre: docudrama/historic, drama, political
    Keyword: capitalism, testimony, global politics, art and politics, political resistance, immigration story, resistfascism, tyranny
    Some plays are a quiet revolution about loud things. Some plays are about the stories we carry in our bones.

    2024 stage premiere, Firehouse Theatre, Virginia.
    2023 official selection, The International Online Theatre Festival (IOTF), The TheatreTimes.com.
    2022 film version, WorkShop Theater, NYC.
    2022. Hobart & William Smith College Theatre livestreamed production....
    Some plays are a quiet revolution about loud things. Some plays are about the stories we carry in our bones.

    2024 stage premiere, Firehouse Theatre, Virginia.
    2023 official selection, The International Online Theatre Festival (IOTF), The TheatreTimes.com.
    2022 film version, WorkShop Theater, NYC.
    2022. Hobart & William Smith College Theatre livestreamed production.
    2022 South Dakota University New Plays Festival.
    2022 LAUNCH PAD, University of California-Santa Barbara
    2022 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize nomination.
    2022 Semi-Finalist, National Playwrights Conference, Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center.
    2021 Future Labs at The Goodman Theatre, Chicago.
    2021 Garry Marshall Theatre New Works Festival, California.


    MEMORIES OF OVERDEVELOPMENT: autocracy, capitalism, resistance, human rights, immigration, art, and friendship.

    This play is a film: a documentary about what people remember about dictatorships where they grew up and how they left and how they survived. An enactment of seven startling, personal interviews, inspired by true stories, performed by two people. A rebellious look at where we’ve been and where we are right now.

  • Nobody's Children by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, political
    Genre: dark comedy, political
    Emma, Neil and Fran are corporate raiders. Jake is an IT guy. Dog eats dog eats love in this dark comedy about globalisation, power, and casual terrorism.
  • The Orphan Sea by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 3
    ·
    Cast: 
    9
    ·
    Genre: drama, experimental + 1 more
    Genre: drama, experimental, fantasy
    Penelope waits. Odysseus roams. Love is suspended in the balance. Years go by as the lovers circle each other in dreams, memories, and are reunited. An operatic choral play about lovers and communities coming together.
  • Prodigal Kiss (a play with songs) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: drama. immigration, American Dream + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: drama. immigration, American Dream, Latinx
    Migration. Longing. The ambiguous promise of the American Dream.

    A Cuban woman floats on a raft, headed for the United States. She is an exile.
    In the US she meets other immigrants from Latin America and Iberia,
    and she learns some hard lessons but also the beauty of finding a new home.

  • The Sadness of Johnny Depp by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 4
    ·
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: Romantic, Latinx
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: Romantic, Latinx
    A genderqueer love story.
    A couple - She and They - near the waves. At the brink of everything. She is Latinx. They is not. They are maybe breaking up, maybe just at that moment where they don't know if they should be together or not.
  • Sanctuary (a Texas song) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    1–3
    ·
    Genre: drama
    Genre: drama
    A road trip through Texas, a walk through the soul, music, and the little moments lived in the everyday. A solo piece for three voices.
  • Something, Like Happiness by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: dark comedy, drama
    Genre: dark comedy, drama
    It’s like this. It’s about love. And other things. Like, how we live. And mess ourselves and each other up. It’s about art and science and the plans we make for our future, which we may never get to see. It’s the stuff of comedy. And tragedy too. And yeah, a bit of heartbreak. But mostly, it’s why we keep doing what we do in this little game called life.
  • SPARK by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: drama, political
    ·
    Keyword: poetry, family + 1 more
    Genre: drama, political
    Keyword: poetry, family, women and war
    Winner of 2013 National Latino Playwriting Award.

    SPARK is a play about three sisters living in the US caught in the mess of a recent war’s aftermath. It is about what happens when soldiers come home, when women of little economic means must find a way to make do and carry on, and the strength, ultimately, of family. A contemporary US story of faith, love, war, trauma, and a bit of healing.
  • STAND by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 9
    ·
    Cast: 
    3–10
    ·
    Genre: drama, movement/physical + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: smashing the patriarchy, womxn rage
    Genre: drama, movement/physical, political, verse
    Keyword: smashing the patriarchy, womxn rage
    2019 Finalist New Works Festival, Kitchen Dog Theater, Dallas.

    STAND is an acoustic electric poem of womxn rage, defiance and ancient power. STAND begins on the day when another womxn from an unnamed village is assaulted. Their name is Cassandra. A chorus gathers ‘round in support of them as they all discover ways in which to rise above collective trauma. This is a play-oratorio. It is also a...
    2019 Finalist New Works Festival, Kitchen Dog Theater, Dallas.

    STAND is an acoustic electric poem of womxn rage, defiance and ancient power. STAND begins on the day when another womxn from an unnamed village is assaulted. Their name is Cassandra. A chorus gathers ‘round in support of them as they all discover ways in which to rise above collective trauma. This is a play-oratorio. It is also a play-drum. or simply, a smash-all-patriarchies text for performance. May be performed with a minimum of three actors (two in chorus, one lead) in its barest form, or five actors or upwards of 10 or more. The play features the song "no hosanna" by composer O-Lan Jones and lyricist Caridad Svich. Described by Simon Stephens as a "beautiful poem of a play: savage and elegant and furious by turns."
  • Steal Back Light from the Virtual by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: drama, experimental + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: dark and twisted
    Genre: drama, experimental, horror, political
    Keyword: dark and twisted
    a labyrinthine society is torn apart by a monstrous beast. this play weaves a dark hypnotic spell centered on how violence permeates systems of class, power, and abuse. shot through the lens of Ariadne and the golden thread and the story of the Minotaur, this is a fearless ride into a dark city. This play was to have received world premiere with East Coast Theatre in Sydney, Australia but was postponed due to...
    a labyrinthine society is torn apart by a monstrous beast. this play weaves a dark hypnotic spell centered on how violence permeates systems of class, power, and abuse. shot through the lens of Ariadne and the golden thread and the story of the Minotaur, this is a fearless ride into a dark city. This play was to have received world premiere with East Coast Theatre in Sydney, Australia but was postponed due to Covid. This play is published in the collection Instructions for Breathing (Seagull Books and University of Chicago Press).
  • Theatre: A Love Story by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 8
    ·
    Cast: 
    4–8
    ·
    Genre: drama, experimental + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: capitalism and late Capitalism, global warming + 1 more
    Genre: drama, experimental, movement/physical, political
    Keyword: capitalism and late Capitalism, global warming, drama
    2021 transmedia world premiere, Know Theatre of Cincinnati.
    Published in winter issue (January 2022) of the Yale School of Drama's THEATER magazine.

    when there’s little time left, what world can we create? What is our theatre?
    a play-conversation & installation about love, catastrophe, capitalism and climate grief, and yes, theatre too.

    THEATRE: A LOVE STORY...
    2021 transmedia world premiere, Know Theatre of Cincinnati.
    Published in winter issue (January 2022) of the Yale School of Drama's THEATER magazine.

    when there’s little time left, what world can we create? What is our theatre?
    a play-conversation & installation about love, catastrophe, capitalism and climate grief, and yes, theatre too.

    THEATRE: A LOVE STORY by Caridad Svich is a love letter, a party, a reckoning, & a celebration of the human connection that defines live theatre. In this virtual promenade-style production the audience will hop links to each new section of the play, following the story through digital space! THEATRE: A LOVE STORY pushes the question of “what is theatre” to the brink—& maybe illuminates new horizons.



  • This Thing of Ours by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: domestic terrorism, coping with tragedy
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: domestic terrorism, coping with tragedy
    An act of violence struck our city. This has happened before. We say we will put our lives back together. Years will go by. We will grow apart, come together, have children, and some of us, will wonder how to keep going, as we turn to myths and seek lessons there. In our theaters of memory, in our songs of transcendence, perhaps we will find peace. An ensemble drama. This play originally was developed at the...
    An act of violence struck our city. This has happened before. We say we will put our lives back together. Years will go by. We will grow apart, come together, have children, and some of us, will wonder how to keep going, as we turn to myths and seek lessons there. In our theaters of memory, in our songs of transcendence, perhaps we will find peace. An ensemble drama. This play originally was developed at the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis Ignite Festival of New Work (2015).
  • 3 Days by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 2
    ·
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: resilience, abortion + 2 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: resilience, abortion, cancer, crisis recovery
    A 20-minute play. Two women on parallel tracks at three different stages in their life.
    They may or may not be the same person.
    This is a play for audio, digital or in person theatre.
  • Town Hall by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 4
    ·
    Cast: 
    4–8
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: ecofeminism, climate change + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: ecofeminism, climate change, democracy
    2020 Premiere: Red Tape Theatre, Chicago (postponed due to COVID-19)
    2020 The Kilroys List.
    2017 Finalist for National Playwrights Conference.

    Eco-Feminism. Citizenship. Democracy. Human Relationships. A play about the times in which we live, a piece of theatre about being an audience, and an epic, intimate work about what we could do to change the world. Town Hall is part play,...
    2020 Premiere: Red Tape Theatre, Chicago (postponed due to COVID-19)
    2020 The Kilroys List.
    2017 Finalist for National Playwrights Conference.

    Eco-Feminism. Citizenship. Democracy. Human Relationships. A play about the times in which we live, a piece of theatre about being an audience, and an epic, intimate work about what we could do to change the world. Town Hall is part play, part dream, part meeting, part imagining a future in which new ways of connecting must be found…. a group of barely connected people come together, feeling their way towards… connection? Town Hall explores how are we “us” in a room? In a theatre?
    "Caridad Svich's beyond timely piece of searching and intimate political playwriting. TOWN HALL tackles so many urgent questions of human relationship - to our environment, to other humans, to democracy, through its focus on 4 women living in the very near future, in a world at once different from but very similar to ours. A beautiful, fragile and powerful piece." -director Rebecca McCutcheon (Lost Text/Found Space, London UK).



  • Ushuaia Blue by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 5
    ·
    Cast: 
    6
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: climate change, complex love story
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: climate change, complex love story
    World Premiere: 2022 Contemporary American Theater Festival. (Postponed from 2020 due to COVID-19)
    Nominated for the 2021 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.
    2020 The Kilroys List.
    2019 Finalist Pasadena Playhouse & Caltech MACH 33 Festival of Science-Driven Plays.

    Jordan is a marine biologist. Sara works in bio-acoustics and film. They have been traveling to do research in...
    World Premiere: 2022 Contemporary American Theater Festival. (Postponed from 2020 due to COVID-19)
    Nominated for the 2021 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.
    2020 The Kilroys List.
    2019 Finalist Pasadena Playhouse & Caltech MACH 33 Festival of Science-Driven Plays.

    Jordan is a marine biologist. Sara works in bio-acoustics and film. They have been traveling to do research in Antarctica for some time now. On a recent trip, Sara connects with Pepa, who is native to Ushuaia, Argentina, at the southernmost tip of the world. This connection begins to affect how she sees the world and how she begins to hear the music of the ice. As Jordan and Sara's relationship as a couple becomes more fragile, Sara suffers an accident. In the land of spirit dreaming, suffering and awakening, lessons are learned about life and climate change.

    A love story set against the backdrop of climate science, this play was inspired by interviews conducted by the playwright with polar marine biologist James McClintock (author of non-fiction book LOST ANTARCTICA).
  • The Vanished by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    5
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: drama, ecology + 2 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: drama, ecology, capitalism, end times
    Synopsis: A play about people being with each other, forging bonds, wrestling with who they’ve become over the passage of time, and seeking too, acts of repair. A birthday tale for the lost children of the earth.
  • The Way of Water by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 3
    ·
    Cast: 
    4
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: contemporary realism, social justice + 1 more
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: contemporary realism, social justice, climate change
    In the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, two fishermen and their wives try to cope with the damage done. This play was developed at the Lark Play Development Center in New York City, and at 50 venues around the world as a NoPassport global reading scheme to commemorate the 2nd anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. The play was the subject of several local NPR shows around the USA. A play...
    In the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, two fishermen and their wives try to cope with the damage done. This play was developed at the Lark Play Development Center in New York City, and at 50 venues around the world as a NoPassport global reading scheme to commemorate the 2nd anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. The play was the subject of several local NPR shows around the USA. A play about love and faith, corporate manslaughter and the power of protest.
  • Window on America by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 3
    ·
    Cast: 
    2
    ·
    Genre: drama
    ·
    Keyword: Americana
    Genre: drama
    Keyword: Americana
    A short play focused on a radio call-in show and the interaction between a caller and the host. A slice of life story between a bewildered, well-meaning caller from Rockville, Indiana and a station that features human interest stories.
  • Trouble in Kind by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    6–10
    ·
    Genre: drama, fable/folktale + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: ritual, hallucinations + 1 more
    Genre: drama, fable/folktale, movement/physical
    Keyword: ritual, hallucinations, uprising
    I'm A, I'm a Nother and I'm a Nother Other live in a small town on the edge of the bayou. In the aftermath of a hate crime, they all seek to re-make their lives. It's gonna take a ritual, a visiting deity and a ghostly encounter at the cross-roads to stir up the waters of progress once again. An incantation play for troubled times inflected with the timbre of tripped-out zydeco blues. This...
    I'm A, I'm a Nother and I'm a Nother Other live in a small town on the edge of the bayou. In the aftermath of a hate crime, they all seek to re-make their lives. It's gonna take a ritual, a visiting deity and a ghostly encounter at the cross-roads to stir up the waters of progress once again. An incantation play for troubled times inflected with the timbre of tripped-out zydeco blues. This play is part of the AMERICAN PSALM seven-play cycle that began with RED BIKE.
  • A Christmas Carol (a comedy, of sorts) ...inspired by Dickens by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    5–15
    ·
    Genre: comedy, holiday + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: A Christmas Carol, comedy
    Genre: comedy, holiday, movement/physical
    Keyword: A Christmas Carol, comedy
    Freely inspired by the Dickens classic, meet EVA GOODGE and the ghosts of their past in this magical and comic tale of capitalism and a long path to redemption. A transformational, theatrical comedy scored for a five-person cast (though may be played with more).
  • Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (based on Mario Vargas Llosa's novel) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    9
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, comedy + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: Latinx
    Genre: adaptation, comedy, period, romantic comedy
    Keyword: Latinx
    2016 New York Times Critics' Pick.
    2021 area premiere at Gala Hispanic Theatre, Washington D.C.
    2022 English language premiere at Main Street Theater Houston.

    Based on Mario Vargas Llosa's acclaimed novel, this comic romance tells the story of a young aspiring playwright living in Lima, Peru, who falls in love with his sexually independent aunt while he works at a radio...
    2016 New York Times Critics' Pick.
    2021 area premiere at Gala Hispanic Theatre, Washington D.C.
    2022 English language premiere at Main Street Theater Houston.

    Based on Mario Vargas Llosa's acclaimed novel, this comic romance tells the story of a young aspiring playwright living in Lima, Peru, who falls in love with his sexually independent aunt while he works at a radio station assisting a comic genius named Pedro Camacho in their soap-opera writing. Charting the May-December romance between the young writer and his aunt and simultaneously his coming-of-age as an artist in a deeply patriarchal Catholic middle-class society, the play is an exuberant tale of love and also an homage/valentine to radio serial dramas and their creation. Originally commissioned and premiered at Repertorio Espanol in New York City in 2016 in the author's Spanish-language version.
  • Blood Wedding [original author Federico Garcia Lorca} by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    14–20
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, drama + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: drama, tragedy + 1 more
    Genre: adaptation, drama, tragedy
    Keyword: drama, tragedy, modern classic
    translation/adaptation of the play by Federico Garcia Lorca.
  • DONA ROSITA, or The Language of Flowers by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    13–18
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, dark comedy + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: early 20th century women's lives, costume drama + 3 more
    Genre: adaptation, dark comedy, drama, translation
    Keyword: early 20th century women's lives, costume drama, domestic tragedy, farce or drama, translation
    Translation/adaptation of the play by Federico Garcia Lorca.

    A story of women confined to roles in society that break them. A tragic farce.
  • The House on the Lagoon (based on Rosario Ferre's novel) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    7
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, drama + 2 more
    ·
    Keyword: puerto rico, class struggle + 3 more
    Genre: adaptation, drama, period, political
    Keyword: puerto rico, class struggle, Politics, 20th century history of women, feminism
    Written for Gala Hispanic Theater, Washington D.C. 2022 world premiere.
    Helen Hayes Award Recommended.

    Epic, sweeping story of Puerto Rican identity, class, race, activism and feminist issues centered on the relationship and marriage between Quintin Mendizabal, a history student turned businessman, and Isabel Monfort, a writer. Spanning the years 1946 to 1979, the play explores the...
    Written for Gala Hispanic Theater, Washington D.C. 2022 world premiere.
    Helen Hayes Award Recommended.

    Epic, sweeping story of Puerto Rican identity, class, race, activism and feminist issues centered on the relationship and marriage between Quintin Mendizabal, a history student turned businessman, and Isabel Monfort, a writer. Spanning the years 1946 to 1979, the play explores the debate between statehood and Independence for Puerto Rico, and how its status as a commonwealth has beleaguered the island's position on the global stage. Ferre's book was a 1995 National Book Award finalist.
  • The House of the Spirits (based on Isabel Allende's novel) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    9–20
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, drama
    ·
    Keyword: family, Latin America
    Genre: adaptation, drama
    Keyword: family, Latin America
    Winner of 2011 American Theatre Critics Association Primus Prize.

    Award-winning play based on Isabel Allende's landmark novel charts the complex
    social and political lives of three generations of a family in an un-named country in Latin America. The conflicted rags to riches rise of a stubborn patriarch is contrasted with the interior and exterior worlds of a grandmother, mother and...
    Winner of 2011 American Theatre Critics Association Primus Prize.

    Award-winning play based on Isabel Allende's landmark novel charts the complex
    social and political lives of three generations of a family in an un-named country in Latin America. The conflicted rags to riches rise of a stubborn patriarch is contrasted with the interior and exterior worlds of a grandmother, mother and daughter growing up in the shadow of violence. This play with songs in the author's Spanish and English language versions has played to audiences across the US and Latin America, professional theatres and colleges. An edition of this play is in TheatreForum magazine Issue No 36.
  • In the Time of the Butterflies (based on Julia Alvarez' novel) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    6–10
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, docudrama/historic + 3 more
    Genre: adaptation, docudrama/historic, drama, period, political
    Based on Julia Alvarez' novel, this play traces the lives of the Mirabal sisters in the Dominican Republic who became activists against and martyrs of the dictatorship of the Trujullo regime. First premiered at Spanish Repertory Theatre in Spanish, English premiere at San Diego Repertory.
  • En el tiempo de las Mariposas (In the Time of the Butterflies) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    7
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, docudrama/historic
    ·
    Keyword: 20th century history, Latine + 2 more
    Genre: adaptation, docudrama/historic
    Keyword: 20th century history, Latine, feminism, 20th century politics

    The story of the Mirabal sisters who fought for justice and human rights during the Trujillo regime era in the Dominican Republic, A story of courage, sisterhood, and tragedy.

  • King Henry VIII (adaoted/translated from Shakespeare) by Caridad Svich
    Recommendations: 1
    ·
    Cast: 
    11
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, translation
    ·
    Keyword: Shakespeare
    Genre: adaptation, translation
    Keyword: Shakespeare
    Originally commissioned by Oregon Shakespeare Festival's Play On!

    New modern verse translation, and adaptation, of Shakespeare's lesser-known play KING HENRY VIII, which focuses on political intrigue during Henry's early days as king.
  • The Oxcart (adapted/translated from Rene Marquez) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    8–9
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, drama + 1 more
    ·
    Keyword: family, puerto rico + 1 more
    Genre: adaptation, drama, period
    Keyword: family, puerto rico, immigration
    A new version (adaptation/translation) of Rene Marques' modern Puerto Rican classic drama THE OXCART. This play tells the story of a Puerto Rican family moving from the slums of La Perla to New York City in the 1950s as they face and grapple with issues of poverty, discrimination, racism and economic justice. A powerful drama about the complex relationship between Puerto Rico and the mainland (USA). Running time: 2 hrs.
  • The Public (adapted/translated from Federico Garcia Lorca) by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    8–30
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, dark comedy + 4 more
    ·
    Keyword: fantasia, dark comedy + 1 more
    Genre: adaptation, dark comedy, experimental, movement/physical, pageant, translation
    Keyword: fantasia, dark comedy, Surreal
    a theatre in ruins. a lost performance of Romeo & Juliet, the classical world smashing into the modern world, an audience ready to revolt. a wild fantastical play about the demands of the public and the limits of authority.
  • YERMA by Caridad Svich
    Cast: 
    10–16
    ·
    Genre: adaptation, drama + 3 more
    ·
    Keyword: domestic tragedy
    Genre: adaptation, drama, fable/folktale, tragedy, translation
    Keyword: domestic tragedy
    A new adaptation/translation of the play by Federico Garcia Lorca, by Caridad Svich.
    world premiere 2023 at Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

    A tragic poem in three acts. The story of a childless woman living in rural Spain, and how her intense desire for motherhood becomes an obsession that drives her to commit a crime.