MIGDALIA CRUZ is a Bronx-born, award-winning playwright, lyricist, translator, and librettist of more than 60 works including: El Grito Del Bronx, Salt, Miriam’s Flowers, & Frida, produced in venues such as CSC, BAM, Latino Chicago Theater Company (where she was writer-in-residence from 1991-98), Mabou Mines, National Theater of Greece, Houston Grand Opera, Ateneo Puertorriqueño, & Teatro Vista. An alumna of New Dramatists, she was named 2019 Co-Chair of Playwriting for the DGF, the 2013 Helen Merrill Distinguished Playwright, and was awarded a 2016 NYFA Grant for Playwriting.  Migdalia was nurtured by Sundance, the Lark, & by Maria Irene Fornés at INTAR. Recently, Migdalia taught the Fornés Playwriting Workshop at Notre Dame/2016-2018, at Princeton/Spring 2018, and as a guest artist at Brown, UMass/Amherst, UNM/Albuquerque, & Yale. She has mentored students from Brown, U. of Guelph in Toronto, and through Rising Circle’s inkTank, in addition to co-mentoring the Latinx Playwrights’ Circle in NYC. She has translated Macbeth & Richard III for OSF’s PlayOn! Shakespeare, and four plays by contemporary Mexican playwrights for the Lark’s Mexico/US Word Exchange. Her work has been published in various presses and journals, including: NoPassport Press, SIU Press, Arte Publico Press, Smith & Krause, Tramoya, & Black Lawrence.

Current projects: FUR @ Teatro Dallas, March 2019; Macbeth & Richard III @CSC for the PlayOn! Shakespeare Festival, June 2019; Macbeth @ AASC in San Francisco, July 2019; & FUR @Boundless Theater/Next Door @NYTW, November 2019. 

CARMEN RIVERA holds an MA in Playwriting and Latin American Theatre from New York University.  Her play, La Gringa, was part of the OBIE Award Winning Series New Voices in 1996 and this year, celebrated its 23rd year anniversary in repertory at Repertorio Español.  It is now the longest running Spanish-language play in Off-Broadway history. It was published in both English and Spanish by Samuel French.   Other plays include:  La Caída De Rafael Trujillo (The Downfall Of Rafael Trujillo); (ATI Award – Best Production); Celia: The Life and Music of Celia Cruz (Co-Written with Cándido Tirado) - (HOLA Award, Outstanding Achievement in Playwriting); La Lupe: My Life, My Destiny (ACE Award – Best Production); Julia de Burgos: Child of Water; To Catch The Lightning (Nomination ACE Award – Best Production.)   

Under The Mango Tree was recently published by Steep Spring Stage Rights.   

Julia De Burgos: Child of Water was published by Red Sugar Cane Press.   To Catch the Lightning and The Downfall of Rafael Trujillo were published by NoPassport Press.   

Betty’s Garage is included in The Women’s Project and Productions: Rowing to America and 16 Other Short Plays.  Carmen is also included in Women Who Make Theatre both published by Smith and Kraus.   Delia’s Race is an included in the anthology, POSITIVE/NEGATIVE – women of color and HIV/AIDS, published by Aunt Lute.  Julia has toured the New York City Public Schools and is included in Nuestro New York, an anthology of Puerto Rican Theatre published by Penguin USA.   Her work can also be found on the online archive, Alexander Street Press.    Carmen has been the recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), ATT On-Stage and New York State Council of the Arts (NYSCA).  

Carmen is a Founding Member and Co-Executive Director of E.P.P. (Educational Play Productions), which brings plays, that deal with social issues into the public schools.   She teaches Playwriting at The School of Drama at The New School and is a Teaching Artist with Manhattan Theatre Club and Repertorio Español. 

For more information on Carmen, check out www.carmenrivera-writer.com.

For more information on EPP, check out www.educationalplayproductions.com

CÁNDIDO TIRADO – (www.candidotirado.com) Playwright:.  His musical, La Canción, is currently running at the Spanish Repertory in NYC.  His play Fish Men, was produced at INTAR (2017) and it was also produced at the Goodman Theatre (2012) in collaboration with Teatro Vista where it was Steinberg nominated and it also received four Jeff nominations. Momma’s Boyz, was produced by Teatro Vista and it was chosen as Chicago Top Ten plays by the Huffington Post. First Class produced by Urban Theater Company in Chicago and was subsequently chosen by Theater On The Lake Festival.  His Off-Broadway productions include Celia: The Life and Music of Celia Cruz (co-written with Carmen Rivera), premiered Off Broadway at The New World Stages and had a 9-month run.  It was also presented in Chicago’s Athenaeum Theater, Las Bellas Artes in Santurce, Puerto Rico; Tenerife and Miami.  Off Broadway plays produced:  King Without a Castle, Checking Out, First Class (The Puerto Rican Traveling Theater). The Barber Shop, Momma’z Boyz (Spanish Repertory). Other productions include: The Missteps of a Salsa Dancer, From Dating to Death in Five Easy Steps, Ilka: The Dream.  King Without a Castle was also work shopped at Sundance Theater Lab.; Some People Have All The Luck was produced at the National Theater of the Dominican Republic and New York. Heart Stopping Sex was produced by Soho Rep.  His other plays include Two Diamonds, Rising From The Ashes, The Kid Next Door, Hey There Black Cat, Abuelo, The Missing Colors of the Rainbow,  And The Pursuit Of Happiness.  House of Souls, Fever and Palladium which are co-written with Carmen Rivera.)  He co-wrote award winning short film with Alfredo Bejar, "Getting to Heaven," and was a staff writer for the TV show Ghostwriter where his episode was nominated for a Humanitas Award.  He was a staff writer for the hit web series East WillyB.  He’s a four-time winner of the New York Foundation of the Arts Playwriting Fellowship. He's a co-founder EDUCATIONAL PLAYS PRODUCTION with his wife Carmen Rivera, which tours the public schools presenting social issues - oriented plays concerning the inner-city youth. 

C. JULIAN JIMENEZ is a Queer, Puerto Rican and Dominican Playwright. He holds an MFA in Acting from The New School for Drama. Playwriting awards include: The 2009 Public Theater Emerging Writers Group, The 2014 Best New Work Motif Award, The 2015 Queens Arts Council Grant, The 2017 & 2018 Pipeline Theatre Company Playlab, The 2018 La Guardia Community College’s LGBTQ History Project Grant, 2019/20 Tira Goldberg Playwrights’ Workshop and The Class of 2025 New Dramatists Residency. Productions include: Man Boobls (Pride Films & Plays, 2011), Nico Was A Fashion Model (Counter-Productions Theatre Company, 2013), Animals Commit Suicide (First Floor Theater, 2015), and Locusts Have No King (INTAR, 2016). Other plays include Alligator Mouth, Another, ¡Oso Fabuloso! & The Bear Backs, Bundle of Sticks, Julio Down By The Schoolyard, and Bruise & Thorn (2018 Playpenn Conference). He is a co-producer and co-writer of the hit web series, Bulk- The Series and an Assistant Professor of Theatre at Queensborough Community College.