SYNOPSIS
PANDORA’S is a multi media theater show that integrates theater and film vignettes to create a series of ten dramatized monologues that provide voice to the Latina/o LGBTQI experience.

PANDORA’S seeks to stage one lens on the queer Latina/o experience which is not represented in popular culture. In order to reach a broad audience, we have expanded our show to even include a Filipino, bringing our shared colonial history with Spain to the stage. Artists have been commissioned from both coasts (New York and California) who wrote about their various Latino identities (Chicano, Afro-Caribbean, South American, Central American, light-skinned Latinas, being a Filipino that is always confused for Latina, ages, Latinas across socio-economic and national boundaries, etc.). Each monologue deals with a specific queer identity such as Bisexual, Lesbian, Questioning, Intersex and Transgender (Male to Female and Female to Male).

PANDORA’S will premiere on July 2-July 6, 2008 at Theatre Row on 42nd Street, at the heart of New York’s theater district. Each night we will be entertaining 100 audience members— over 600 people will see this show. And we are organizing an exhaustive media and outreach campaign for this show that will travel this show across the country.

Along with the theater project, an Ending Homo-Hatred Outreach Toolkit will be distributed to audience members during the show. The Toolkit will be in the form of a booklet and will consist of methodologies for combating internal and external homophobia, organizations that can be excellent resources for outreach and other information, a list of articles/essays, books, etc., and workshops that can be attended in order to gain more information. Everyday people and organizations will be able to use this toolkit to create a space for artistic freedom and justice for LGBTQI communities of color.

THE MONOLOGUE

BE ALL YOU CAN BE Written by Deya García and Sofía Quintero
Performed by Julia Ahumada Grob
On the eve before she is to report for a second tour in Iraq, a Dominican army sergeant decides to go AWOL.

CHEWY–n–JOCELYN 4 EVAH Written by Lissette J. Norman
Performed by Dominique Andriese
A runaway teen must choose between the homophobia of her Dominican homeland or that of the streets of New York City.

CIORA Written by Sandra Alvarez and Aurora Guerrero
Performed by Desiree Cobb
A Colombian woman struggles to redefine familia as she prepares her body for motherhood.

CONFIDENTIALITY Written by Jasmine Colón
Performed by Sherette Gregg
When the parents of a teenage patient threaten to send her to 'ex-gay' reparative therapy, her counselor finds herself caught between her professional code of ethics and the truth of her own experience.

DON'T KNOCK IT 'TIL YOU TRY IT Written by Desi Moreno-Penson
Performed by Desi Moreno-Penson
A conservative woman in her 40s finally gives in to her husband's demand for a threesome.

ID, Please! Written by Tina Bartolome
Performed by Daphne Lopez
An underage Filipina always confused for Puerto Rican tries to enter the nightclub only to discover that her closeted aunt is working the door.

PASSING Written by Janis Astor del Valle
Performed by Janis Astor del Valle
A Puerto Rican transgender male in transition has second thoughts about going through sex reassignment surgery.

PATRíA Written by Julia Carias and Elisha Miranda
Performed by Karen J. Robles
Patría is given an ultimatum; either get married or get deported to Honduras.

THE BORDER MADE ME GAY Written by Fernanda Coppel
Performed by Carina Gregorio
On her 21st birthday, a college student yearns for the mother who returned to Mexico without her.

TWENTY-FOUR Written by Aurora Guerrero
Performed by Claudia Acosta
Just as she is set to marry her boyfriend of thirteen years, Chela reflects on her life prior to him.