LOS NUTCRACKERS: A CHRISTMAS CARAJO Comes to BAAD! The Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance

BAAD! The Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance will present Los Nutcrackers: A Christmas Carajo, written by Charles Rice-González and directed by Chris Rivera. This year marks the play’s 21st year at BAAD!, and the first time that Rivera helms the work. The play interweaves two holiday classics, The Nutcracker and A Christmas Carol To create a queer, Latinx play about a couple who go on a psychedelic trip through their lives one Christmas Eve. In-person performances are on December 6, 7, 8, 13, and 14 at 8 pm, with an additional matinee performance on December 7th at 3 pm. All in-person performances are at BAAD!, 2474 Westchester Avenue in the Westchester Square section of the Bronx.

The play features a talented and vibrant cast of Latinx actors with  Chris Rivera, Joe Perez, Richard Rivera,  Ansi Rodríguez, and new cast members include Michael Michelle Lynch (in the role as The Guide) and Leonidus González.

Charles Rice-González has written several plays including Pink Jesus, The Artist and I Just Love Andy Gibb published in Blacktino Queer Performance: A Critical Anthology (Duke Press) and produced at Pregones Theater. His lauded debut novel, Chulito, is about a 16-year-old, Latino tough boy coming out in the South Bronx, and he co-edited the anthology From Macho to Mariposa: New Gay Latino Fiction. He has published over two dozen works and has won several awards including the 2014 Emerging Writers Award from the Lambda Literary Foundation, the 2022 PEN America Writing as Activism Fellowship,  a 2022 MacDowell Fellowship where he was named a James Baldwin fellow and the 2024 etras Boricuas Fellowship. He received an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College.

With a background at the Tony award-winning Alley Theatre in Texas, Chris Rivera excels as a director, internationally produced playwright, award-winning actor, and educator at the New York Film Academy. In New York he has directed Romeo and Juliet, Julius Caesar, and Dog Sees God for What Dreams May Company and Queens Shakespeare. Rivera also directed Chasing Heroes for Two Cherry productions, and his own original plays Our Own Odyssey and Back to You with FUERZAfest. His production company, Turn to Flesh Productions, has produced several one-act plays for The Secret Theater, the Midtown International Festival, and Manhattan Repertory, and recently a few film projects. Rivera appeared in Los Nutcrackers in 2021 and will also perform in this year’s production.

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