Borderlands Theater Presents BORDERLINE THEATRE CORDIALLY INVITES YOU TO AN IN PROCESS SHOWING OF ANTIGONA 3.0

Borderlands Theater will present Borderline Theatre Cordially Invites You To An In Process Showing of Antigona 3.0, written by Borderlands Theater Ensemble and Jesus I. Valles.

Performed by BT ensemble: Jonathan, Milta Ortiz, Marc David Pinate, Adam Cooper- Teran, and Gertie Lopez. Co-directed by Roweena Mackay and Marc David Pinate.

The pressure is on when a small Latiné theatre ensemble receives the biggest grant of their careers to write an adaptation of Antigone set in the borderlands. A postcolonial dark comedy that takes an irreverent look at the American Theatre, the US-Mexico border, and the generational trauma that has plagued us all from the ancient Greeks to present day Chicanx artists.

About The Play

Borderline Theatre Cordially Invites You To An In-Process Showing Of Antigona 3.O Made Possible By A Very Important Grant consists of three actors, a musician, and a tech operator, who also acts in the show. All play a character version of themselves. Post-modern, post-dramatic, post-colonial, and metatheatrical, this dark comedy deconstructs the Greek classic, Antigone, to examine generational trauma, and the dehumanization of migrants at the border in Arizona.

Aesthetically, the piece relies heavily on digital projections on a 30' x 10' voile scrim, positioned in front of most of the play's action, to conjure setting, simulate holograms, and as the space where the Desert Chorus (the ghosts of migrants who have died in the desert) resides. The scrim doubles as border and the video as character on stage.

The Process

The play was devised in collaboration with undocumented writer/performers who performed in earlier workshop productions, and whose influence and contributions remain in the final version. Thanks to a partnership with Scholarships AZ. Tohono O'odham oral history contributes to the border experience, land stewardship and ties to the land. Jesus I. Valles facilitated undocumented/dacamented workshop, and contributed choral odes, and helped shape the play.

Themes

Attempting to ‘write an adaptation of Antigone (the play's central action) the play's protagonists (an ensemble of Bipoc theatre makers) satirically explore a multitude of theatre genres giving the play its comedic and metatheatrical slant. Antigona 3.0 follows a long tradition of using Antigone as the basis for political discourse on patriarchy and authoritarianism - Anouilh during WWII in Paris (1944), and Gamboa during Argentina's “Dirty War” (1985) as two notable examples. The play continuously analyzes and comments on itself in real time. Simultaneously, ANTIGONA 3.0 juxtaposes an examination of funding and colorism in the American Theatre against the legacy of generational trauma due to colonization that affects BIPOC in the borderlands.

MORE ON THE COLLABORATING ARTISTS:

Co-Director: Roweena Mackay has been working in theatre, film & television for a very long time.  Highlights include: assistant directing the world premiere of Radio Golf by August Wilson @yalerep, directing Pinter's The Lover @yalecabaret; dramaturging for Culture Clash, Liz Swados, Mac Wellman, Rhiana Yazzie and Jon Bernson; co-founding Bone Orchard and devising Times 365:24:7, coordinating the art department for Boots Riley's first feature Sorry to Bother You,  producing Erin Buckley's first short CC Dances the Go-Go @FilmTucson; co-producing a staged reading of Jess Scott's new play t4t, directing Branden Jacobs-Jenkins's play Everybody with Rick Wamer @UA_TFTV; devising All About Love with Chaos Theatre @tucsoncatalyst and researching for the Presumed Innocent writers room @appletv. Roweena is a UNM alumni, has an MFA from the David Geffen School of Drama and teaches at the University of Arizona and Tohono O'odham Community College. 

Co-director/playwright/actor: Marc David Pinate has worked with noteworthy theaters across the country including Magic Theatre, Campo Santo, El Teatro Campesino, ShadowLight Productions, Steppenwolf, and Victory Gardens. He was the recipient of a Doris Duke three-year residency at La Peña Cultural Center in Berkeley, California where he founded the Hybrid Performance Experiment known for their site-specific theatre performances. Marc was a member of the spoken word troupe, Chicano Messengers of Spoken Word which received a National Performance Network commission to co-author Fear of a Brown Planet. In June 2013, he completed an MFA in Directing from The Theatre School at DePaul University. Pinate is the Producing Artistic Director of Borderlands Theater where he conceived and directed Mas, a docu-theater project about the banning of ethnic studies in Arizona incorporating indigenous ceremony; and the Barrio Stories projects – a series of large scale, site specific creative placemaking spectacles bringing professional artists in collaboration with community members and cross-sector partners to preserve the character and heritage of Tucson's historic Mexican American neighborhoods. From 2018-2019 was part of the Arizona Creative Communities inaugural cohort, a one-year program, sponsored by Arizona State University's Herberger Institute of Art and Design and the Arizona Commission on the Arts designed to develop placemaking and civic practice projects throughout the state of Arizona.  His innovative efforts have been featured in American Theatre magazine, HowlRound, Arizona Daily Star, and Remezcla to name a few. He taught theatre at San Jose State University, and Pima Community College, University of Arizona where he also directed.

Playwright/actor: Milta Ortiz an award-winning playwright is developing Anita, a musical in collaboration with composer Quetzal Guerrero at Borderlands Theater. Milta was a 2020-21 Projecting All Voices Mellon fellow at Arizona State University. Milta directed The Candy Craze: A Sticky Situation in 2023, and Ballet & Bagels in 2022, plays she facilitated Pima students in writing, an ongoing project at Pima Community College. Pilar and Paloma was part of Launchpad's 2021 Bipoc Reading Series Festival and Cleveland Public Theater Reading Festival (2023). Judge Torres, commissioned and produced by Milagro Theatre Group, toured nationally to universities (2019-2020). Milta is Associate Artistic Director at Borderlands Theater, where a few of her plays, including Sanctuary (2018) and Más (2015) have world premiered. Borderlands' production of Más toured Arizona universities in the 2016-17 season. Más was produced at Ubuntu Theatre Project/Laney College (2016), Su Teatro (2017), and San Diego State University (2018). She devised, wrote and directed Solving for X for the Working Classroom in their 2016/2017 season. She earned an MFA from Northwestern University. She is proud to serve on the National New Play Network board of directors and as commissioner for the Tucson Convention Center.

Playwright/Actor: Jonathan Heras is an actor and singer from Yuma, Arizona and now a Tucson performing artist and member of the Borderlands Theater Ensemble.  He has worked with various local theaters including Live Theatre Workshop, Stories That Soar, Gaslight Theater, and many more. He develops and writes content with a group of artists called Digital Desmadre to create content and raise awareness through social media platforms. He has worked with youth as a theater teaching artist for over 10 years and is currently the director of education and development at Borderlands Theater and the musical director at Sal Pointe Catholic High School.

Video design/Actor: Adam Cooper-Terán (ACT) is a native of Tucson, Arizona, born from a mixed heritage of Mexican, Yaqui, and Jewish roots. Known for their collaborations among various performance troupes, theater companies, musicians, and dancers, Adam's work has featured across the globe as large-scale media projections, musical interventions, and installations of digital storytelling.Adam's work as a DIY performer, producer, and designer has led to residencies at Project Row Houses in Houston, Latino/Chicanx arts organization MACLA in San Jose, Teatro Tespys in El Carmen de Viboral, Colombia, Universidad Cd. Juárez, and the University of Rostock, Germany. Adam has garnered praise and support from academic and cultural institutions such as the MAP Fund, National Endowment for the Arts, National Performers Network, Network for Ensemble Theaters, Arizona State University, Belle Foundation, Foundation for Contemporary Arts, National Hispanic Cultural Center, and the International Sonoran Desert Alliance. Current projects involve the disruption of mainstream media, however possible, while continuing to support and augment underrepresented voices across the spectrum.

Playwright/Poet: Jesús I. Valles (they/them) is a queer Mexican immigrant, educator, writer-performer from Cd. Juarez/El Paso. Valles is the winner of the 2023 Yale Drama Series, selected by Jeremy O. Harris (Bathhouse.pptx), the winner of the 2022 Kernodle Playwriting Prize (a river, its mouths), and the 2022 Emerging Theatre Professional, selected by The National Theatre Conference. As a playwright, Valles received support from The Bushwick Starr, Clubbed Thumb, The Flea, The Kennedy Center, The Lortel, Manhattan Theatre Club, New York Theatre Workshop, OUTsider Festival, The Playwrights' Center, Sewanee Writers' Conference, Teatro Vivo, and The VORTEX. As a poet, Valles received fellowships from CantoMundo, Community of Writers, Idyllwild Arts, Lambda Literary, Tin House, and Undocupoets. Valles is a Core Apprentice of the Playwrights' Center and received their MFA in writing for performance from Brown University.  

Photo Credit: Anita Chavarin-Rodriguez

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