A key way to view Latina plays today is through the foundational frame of playwright and teacher Maria Irene Fornes, who has trained a generation of theatre artists and transformed the field of American theatre. Fornes, author of Fefu and Her Friends and Sarita and a nine-time Obie Award winner, is known for her plays that traverse cultural, spiritual, and aesthetic borders. In The Fornes Frame: Contemporary Latina Playwrights and the Legacy of Maria Irene Fornes, Anne García-Romero considers the work of five award-winning Latina playwrights in the early twenty-first century, offering her unique perspective as a theatre studies scholar who is also a professional playwright. The playwrights in this book include Pulitzer Prize–winner Quiara Alegría Hudes; Obie Award–winner Caridad Svich; Karen Zacarías, resident playwright at Arena Stage in Washington, DC; Elaine Romero, member of the Goodman Theatre Playwrights Unit in Chicago, Illinois; and Cusi Cram, company member of the LAByrinth Theater Company in New York City. Using four key concepts—cultural multiplicity, supernatural intervention, Latina identity, and theatrical experimentation—García-Romero shows how these playwrights expand past a consideration of a single culture toward broader, simultaneous connections to diverse cultures. The playwrights also experiment with the theatrical form as they redefine what a Latina play can be. Following Fornes’s legacy, these playwrights continue to contest and complicate Latina theatre.

Decentered Playwriting investigates new and alternative strategies for dramatic writing that incorporate non-Western, Indigenous, and underrepresented storytelling techniques and traditions while deepening a creative practice that decenters hegemonic methods. A collection of short essays and exercises by leading teaching artists, playwrights, and academics in the fields of playwriting and dramaturgy, this book focuses on reimagining pedagogical techniques by introducing playwrights to new storytelling methods, traditions, and ways of studying, and teaching diverse narratological practices. This is a vital and invaluable book for anyone teaching or studying playwriting, dramatic structure, storytelling at advanced undergraduate and graduate levels, or as part of their own professional practice.

The Decades of Modern American Playwriting series provides a comprehensive survey and study of the theatre produced in each decade from the 1930s to 2009 in eight volumes. Each volume equips readers with a detailed understanding of the context from which work emerged: an introduction considers life in the decade with a focus on domestic life and conditions, social changes, culture, media, technology, industry and political events; while a chapter on the theatre of the decade offers a wide-ranging and thorough survey of theatres, companies, dramatists, new movements and developments in response to the economic and political conditions of the day. The work of the four most prominent playwrights from the decade receives in-depth analysis and re-evaluation by a team of experts, together with commentary on their subsequent work and legacy. A final section brings together original documents such as interviews with the playwrights and with directors, drafts of play scenes, and other previously unpublished material. The major playwrights and their plays to receive in-depth coverage in this volume include: David Mamet: Edmond (1982), Glengarry Glen Ross (1984), Speed-the-Plow (1988) and Oleanna (1992); David Henry Hwang: Family Devotions (1981), The Sound of a Voice (1983) and M. Butterfly (1988); Maria Irene Fornès: The Danube (1982), Mud (1983) and The Conduct of Life (1985); August Wilson: Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (1984), Joe Turner's Come and Gone (1984) and Fences (1987).

Fifty Key Figures in Latinx and Latin American Theatre is a critical introduction to the most influential and innovative theatre practitioners in the Americas, all of whom have been pioneers in changing the field. The chosen artists work through political, racial, gender, class, and geographical divides to expand our understanding of Latin American and Latinx theatre while at the same time offering a space to discuss contested nationalities and histories. Each entry considers the artist’s or collective’s body of work in its historical, cultural, and political context and provides a brief biography and suggestions for further reading. The volume covers artists from the present day to the 1960s—the emergence of a modern theatre that was concerned with Latinx and Latin American themes distancing themselves from an European approach. A deep and enriching resource for the classroom and individual study, this is the first book that any student of Latinx and Latin American theatre should read.

"Matters of Inscription: Reading Figures of Latinidad argues that Latinx inscriptions require us to read at the edge of materiality and semiosis, charting a nimble method for "reading" various forms of Latinx marks and even the word Latinx across art, performance, poetry, plays, and fiction"--

Western Theatre in Global Contexts explores the junctures, tensions, and discoveries that occur when teaching Western theatrical practices or directing English-language plays in countries that do not share Western theatre histories or in which English is the non-dominant language. This edited volume examines pedagogical discoveries and teaching methods, how to produce specific plays and musicals, and how students who explore Western practices in non-Western places contribute to the art form. Offering on-the-ground perspectives of teaching and working outside of North American and Europe, the book analyzes the importance of paying attention to the local context when developing theatrical practice and education. It also explores how educators and artists who make deep connections in the local culture can facilitate ethical accessibility to Western models of performance for students, practitioners and audiences. Western Theatre in Global Contexts is an excellent resource for scholars, artists, and teachers that are working abroad or on intercultural projects in theatre, education and the arts.

Major new collection of Latina/o contemporary work for the stage.