New Mexico State University

Come be a part of the process – possibly even originating a role- for a new play as a part of our High Desert Play Development Workshop and Festival.

 

We’re auditioning for two full-length readings by professional playwrights who will be in residence with us here in Las Cruces, as well as short plays and excerpts of full-lengths by students and other local writers.

 

Available roles span many age, ethnic, racial and gender identities.  Anyone ages 16+ is encouraged to audition!

 

There are copies of the scripts available for you to read at Britney Stout, NMSU Theatre’s office administrator’s desk. Her desk is in the Theatre office hallway on the 3rd floor of ASNMSU Center for the Arts (CFTA).

 

Descriptions of the full-length plays and the roles in those plays are included below. 

Please keep in mind that we will also be casting for more than 20 roles in the short plays and excerpts with roles that span across many different identities.

 

Rehearsals for the short plays and excerpts will begin Monday, January 26th.  Rehearsals for the full-lengths will begin Sunday, February 15th.  All rehearsals will take place in the evenings.  The public readings (performances) will take place March 6-8 at ASNMSU Center for the Arts.  Rehearsals will not conflict with ACTF, and in general, High Desert is less of a time commitment than a full production at NMSU. A detailed rehearsal schedule will be available at auditions.  Please feel free to reach out to Professor Larissa Lury with any questions at llury@nmsu.edu.

 

* If you are called back for Superhero, you will find out within 30 mins of your original audition time, so that you will know whether you need to wait around or come back.

 ** If you already auditioned in November, and indicated on your audition form that you wanted to be considered for High Desert, then you do not need to re-audition, but you will hear from us about callbacks. If you did not want to be considered for High Desert at the time, but do now, please sign up for a Friday time slot.  If you have any doubt, please ask Larissa.

Struggling with severe depression, You return to your hometown in Texas, right by the river that raised You, right on the border with Mexico. It’s the summer of 2019 and the Rio Bravo keeps claiming migrants’ lives during their perilous crossings. However, the people in your hometown are much more interested in talking about "The Rio Grande mermaid,” a creature rumored to haunt the river, clawing its way out of the sand, out of the water, into the air, into your head, haunting the mouths of family, friends, and strangers. Something in the water calls to You. “Come,” the river says, “Come to me.”

 

A NOTE ON CASTING: This is a busy, noisy play. It can be cast many ways and will allow for as little as six actors, but as many as there are roles in each track. The idea is to create the soundscape, the affective texture of a small town. Cast as you’d like. Go wild.

ACTOR 1 plays

ACTOR 2 plays

ACTOR 3 plays

ACTOR 4 plays

ACTOR 5 plays

ACTOR 6 plays

• YOU...he/him or they/them, Mexican-American. Late 20s, early 30s. Law school drop-out,

prodigal child, struggling with severe depression, suicide ideation, and longing for water.

Imagine this play is a spell. Imagine all language is just skin,
Spanish, English, just a thin film of sound covering all that we actually are; water. Imagine that moments of crisis allow us to detach ourselves from the sense-making of time, of language, of logic. Imagine life besides itself.

 

***

Coming from a long line of superheroes disguised as campesinos, Maricela dreams of the day she’ll have the super powers her family has hidden. When Maricela is taken out of the fields and put into public school her family is terrified that their secret identities will be revealed. Maricela’s world is shattered as she struggles to fight for what she believes is right in a world she doesn’t understand. Blending childhood imagination with harsh reality, Macedo’s play redefines heroism, honoring the daily resilience, tenacity, and determination of Mexican immigrants that make them everyday heroes.

 

All performers should be Chicano/Latine

 

MARICELA - 10 years old. Loves her family, drawing, and dreams of becoming a superhero.

ALBA - Maricela's Mama.

ABUELITA - Maricela's Abuela, and Ricardo's Mama. Goofy. A magician with needle and thread.

RICARDO - Maricela's Papa. Wears his heart on his sleeve.

MRS. HAM - 5th grade teacher. Has been teaching for decades. Everything she says bounces off of your ears and with a Snow White, sing-song whimsicality.

GUADALUPE - Maricela's first friend. Always says what's on her mind.

LUCIANO - Maricela's second friend. Future fútbol player.

BETSY - 6th grade girl. Her parents put her in gymnastics.

THE CAMPESINOS - The migrant farmworkers responsible for the food on our tables.

LA MIGRA OFFICERS

 

Maricela – La Giganta Campesina

Alba – Guadalupe, La Mariposa, Mr. Ham

Abuelita – Mrs. Ham, Officer 1, La Momia

Ricardo – Officer 3, Betsy, El Luchador

Luciano – Mrs. Ham, Betsy, La Beastia, Officer 2

 

***

Jesús I. Valles (they/them) is a queer Mexican immigrant, educator, writer-performer from Cd. Juarez/El Paso. Jesús is the 2023 Yale Drama Series winner (Bathhouse.pptx), selected by Jeremy O. Harris, the 2022 Emerging Theatre Professional awarded by the National Theatre Conference, and the winner of the 2022 Kernodle Playwriting Prize (a river, its mouths). Their playwriting work has also received awards and support from OUTSider festival, Teatro Vivo, The VORTEX, The Kennedy Center, New York Theatre Workshop, The Latino Theatre Co. at the LATC, and The Flea. As an actor, they are the recipient of four B. Iden Payne Awards, including Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama (2018), and Outstanding Original Script (2018) and they were nominated for the Mark David Cohen New Play Award for their play, (Un)Documents. They also starred as (not) Penny Marshall in New York Theatre Workshop's Pinching Pennies with Penny Marshall: Death Rituals for Penny Marshall, written by Victor I. Cazares. Jesús a 2021 CantoMundo fellow at the Palm Beach Poetry Festival, a 2021 Lambda Literary fellow, a 2019 Walter E. Dakin Playwriting Fellow of the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, a recipient of the 2019 Letras Latinas Scholarship from the Community of Writers’ Poetry Workshop, and a 2019 poetry fellow at Idyllwild Arts Writers Week. Jesús is also a 2018 Undocupoets Fellow, a 2018 Tin House Scholar, a fellow of The 2018 Poetry Incubator, and the runner-up in the 2017 Button Poetry Chapbook Contest. Their work has been published in Shade Literary, The Texas Review, The New Republic, Palabritas, The Acentos Review, Quarterly West, The Mississippi Review, Palette, The Adroit Journal, BOAAT, The McNeese Review, and PANK. Their poetry has also been featured on NPR’s Code Switch, The Slowdown, The BreakBeat Poets' LatiNext Anthology, the Best New Poets 2020 anthology, and the anthology, Somewhere We Are Human.

 

Alexis Elisa Macedo - worth every letter - is an unapologetic, produced, and published Chicana playwright, producer and performer. She’s a National Theater Institute Alum (Spring ‘20, Theatermakers ‘22) and has her BA in Theater Arts - Acting Emphasis (Fresno State ‘21) Macedo is a Latinx Playwrights Circle Intensive Mentee and was awarded the Sewanee Writers’ Conference - SolProject Fellowship, Individual Artist Fellowship from the California Arts Council; and is a Member of the Miranda Family Fellowship Advisory Board, where she heads the Big/Little Mentorship Program. Her recent acting credits include: Fatso Goes to McDonald’s (PVD Fringe), Someone Will Remember Us (Trinity Rep), L.A. Muerta (Teatro Chelsea), Yerma in Vitro (Dramatic Question Theater) Her play credits include: CHICANA LEGEND (The Fools Collaborative, SheATL) Red Hood(ie) (Lime Arts Productions 20x20 Fringe, published by Next Stage Press,) and, Under the Sheet (Moxie NYC Arts). Macedo is currently the Education and Outreach Coordinator for Teatro ECAS, non-profit, bilingual theater in Providence, Rhode Island. You can find more of Macedo’s work on Youtube, NPX and her website. www.alexiselisamacedo.com Not too bad for a little brown girl from Reedley, California.

 

A Picture of a Woman on an Island by Lucene Drissell

A Simple Boon by Hyacinth Faye Panganiban

Roamers by Constance Hasapopoulos

Sitting Naked by the Phone by Maria Torres

I Forgot to Hide Daryl by Drea Hurell

Old Friends by Mary A. Rogan

Paper Crutches by James Jerome

Rey De La Luna by Diego Muñoz Holguin

The Book of John by Alycia Herrera