The Huntington Reveals DON'T EAT THE MANGOS Cast And Creative Team

The Huntington announces the cast and creative team of Don't Eat the Mangos, a wickedly funny tragedy written by Ricardo Pérez González and directed by Obie Award-winner David Mendizábal. Don't Eat the Mangos runs from Wednesday, March 26 – Sunday, April 27, 2025 at the Calderwood Pavilion at the BCA (527 Tremont St).

Playwright Ricardo Pérez González's wickedly funny tragedy Don't Eat the Mangos portrays life on his home island of Puerto Rico with compassion and humor through the saga of three sisters living just outside San Juan. As a hurricane approaches the beautiful island, secrets and ugly truths are revealed that cause the sisters to wrestle with how to stay true to their familia and homeland – and seek a satisfying revenge. David Mendizábal returns from the acclaimed world premiere production to direct.

“After its critically acclaimed premiere at the Magic was cut short by San Francisco's shelter in place order five years ago, Don't Eat the Mangos is long overdue for a major production,” says Huntington Artistic Director Loretta Greco. “This piece unleashes the gravitas of myth in the tight quarters of a family's kitchen. It's an honor to bring Ricardo's bold vision to The Huntington, launching this extraordinary play where it belongs in the theatre canon.”

Called “quietly beautiful, tentatively hopeful, oddly unsettling, and ultimately healing” by BroadwayWorld and a “great American family drama” by the San Francisco Chronicle, Don't Eat the Mangos was developed in part at the 2019 Sundance Institute Theatre Lab and also partly developed and supported through a partnership between the Sol Project and Magic Theatre. It was first produced in March 2020 as a National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere by the Magic Theatre, which was helmed by Loretta Greco at the time before she came to The Huntington in Boston. Unfortunately, the run of the premier production at the Magic was cut short due to Covid-19. In Spring of 2022, the play saw a well-reviewed run by Apollinaire Theatre with Teatro Chelsea. GBH Executive Arts Editor Jared Bowen called the story “innovative” and “daring.”

“This is a deeply personal story. It's my story. It's my family's story. It's an allegory for the story of my people. And it speaks to the story of our moment,” says playwright Ricardo Pérez González. “Mangos, with unflinching humor and grit, offers a look at what healing could look like. It's not pretty, it's not easy, but at its heart, this is the story of a family trying to heal itself.”

The cast of Don't Eat the Mangos includes:

Jessica Pimentel as Ismelda, the eldest sister, a banker, and dutiful daughter. Credits include: Orange is the New Black on Netflix, and Jasper and Surfer Girl Off Broadway.

Yesenia Iglesias as Yinoelle, the middle child, a mother of two, who might be about to move off the island. Credits include: Primary Trust and Daphne's Dive at Signature Theatre, and Metamorphoses at Folger Theatre.

Evelyn Howe as Wicha, the youngest sister, a teacher, who cannot keep a secret. Credits include: Yerma at The Huntington, The Motherf**ker with the Hat at SpeakEasy Stage, and Lost Tempo at Boston Playwrights' Theatre.

Susanna Guzmán as Mami, the sisters' mother, in treatments for cancer, who loves her daughters fiercely. Credits include: Mary Jane on Broadway, Downstate Off Broadway, and Project Dawn at People's Light.

José Ramón Rosario as Papi, the head of the family, in failing health. Credits include: Christopher Columbus, Rum and Coke, and Forbidden City Blues Off Broadway.

Understudies include: Karina Beleno Carney, Carla Martinez, and Michael Sáenz.

The creative team for Don't Eat the Mangos includes scenic design by Tanya Orellana (What Became of Us at Atlantic Stage 2), costume design by Zoë Sundra (John Proctor is the Villain at The Huntington), lighting design by Cha See (Oh, Mary! on Broadway), and sound design and original music by Jake Rodriguez (Between Two Knees at Oregon Shakespeare Festival) with Alexandra Buschman-Román, and Jason Stamberger.

The assistant director is Amelia Rose Estrada. The voice and dialect coach is Adi Cabral and the fight director and intimacy consultant is Ted Hewlett. The production stage manager is Emily F. McMullen and the stage manager is Jake Mariño. Casting is by Kate Murray, CSA.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Ricardo Pérez González (Playwright) (he/him) is a queer Puerto Rican artist with mofongo on his lips and salsa on his hips. He writes for stage, screen, and TV and teaches at institutions such as Harvard, NYU, and Yale. As a playwright, his first play, the story of the WWI Christmas Truce In Fields Where They Lay, was hailed by the NY Times as “gripping” and “moving drama.” Since then, Sundance selected Ricardo for their inaugural Writer's Intensive and his Alan Turing Biopic, The Tender Peel, won him an Alfred P. Sloan award. He is an alumnus of the Emerging Writers Group at The Public Theater, the Sundance Theatre Lab, The Sundance Episodic Lab, Sundance's Episodic Pitch Parlor, and is a winner of the MetLife Nuestras Voces National Playwriting Award.

His play Don't Eat the Mangos was winner of the SF Chronicle's Glickman Award for Best Play (“[A] reminder that great family dramas are still being written” – SF Chronicle). It premiered at The Magic in SF under the direction of David Mendizábal. His play On the Grounds of Belonging was workshopped at the Public and premiered at Long Wharf. It's the first in a trilogy that follows a mixed-race pair of lovers who meet in 1950s racially segregated gay bars from the 1950s to the present. The remaining two plays will premiere at Long Wharf in the coming seasons.

As a TV writer, he worked on the third season of Netflix's Designated Survivor and recently created a sci-fi mystery podcast set in the high-flying world of female gymnastics, Flipped, with Law & Order's Neal Baer and Syfy's Mark Stern. With Neal, he is also developing The Edit, a CRISPR-inspired TV drama, for Sony and director Seth Gordon, as well as Tiergarten, a gripping queer romance/murder-mystery set in Berlin. He co-wrote the script for the feature film The Rest Of Us with Laura Moss, produced by Mary Stuart Masterson. Ricardo sold his first drama pitch, Orlando, to Charter/Spectrum with Nina Tassler and Denise DiNovi. Orlando follows a family devastated by Hurricane Maria as the storm impacts relatives both in Puerto Rico and Orlando, Florida. Ricardo was also an Artist in Residence in the Media, Medicine, and Health Program at Harvard. In addition to the universities where he teaches, Ricardo has conducted workshops with Sundance, Pomona College, Big Apple Playback Theatre, and the New York School of Playback. MFA NYU Tisch. ricardoperezgonzalez.com 

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