Jose Rivera Selected Works

How many of us have wished for one more chance to say the right thing? A Better Orpheus Inc. provides an alternative to regret—a service that allows the living to communicate with the dead. When Nikki Corona loses her twin sister, A Better Orpheus puts her in touch with Orlando, a man dying too young. The ensuing love story leads to a quest through a vivid, fantastical afterlife as Orlando learns whether Nikki’s message to her sister has the ability to transcend death. In the rich literary tradition of magical realism and inspired by Dante’s Inferno, The Untranslatable Secrets of Nikki Corona suggests that with love, all things are possible.

In Rivera’s interpretation of the classic Jean Genet play, two maids, sisters Monique and Yvette, dream of liberating Vieques from La Doña, mistress of the largest sugar plantation on the island. Rituals are enacted, roles are reversed, identities become fluid, bombs fall, poison is consumed, genders collide, and a psycho-sexual drama is unleashed as the trio struggles with the meaning of power, sisterhood, and freedom.

In a waiting room for the afterlife, we find a dreamscape filled with poignant, funny, lyrical and haunting monologues from recently deceased individuals.

Sueño is Obie Award-winning playwright José Rivera's translation and adaptation of Calderón de la Barca's classic Life Is a Dream.

Set in 1635, this metaphysical drama—renowned as one of the jewels of the Spanish Golden Age—follows the life of young Prince Segismundo, heir to the Spanish throne, who is imprisoned at birth when astrologers predict his reign as king will result in the country's ruin. The brilliant, passionate prince is raised in isolation. His only companions are the nobleman Clotaldo and a God whose very existence he questions. When his father King Basilio finds his own life ending without a legitimate heir, he releases Segismundo and places him on the throne. If Segismundo is gentle and civilized, Basilio reasons, he will be allowed to reign. If he is as wild and barbaric as the stars predicted, he'll be sent back to his imprisonment and told that his brief moment of freedom and power was only a dream. When the tormented Segismundo demonstrates the worst of the astrologers' fears and is sent back to the tower, he's forever unable to distinguish between real life and the world of dreams. Sueño is written in sharp contemporary language but it nevertheless seeks to ask the eternal questions posed by Calderon: What is man—an angel or an animal? What is honor? What is freedom? If life is a dream, who is dreaming us? Could God Himself be the greatest dream of all?

Dali is a contemporary drama set in the desert heat of Barstow, California, where Gabriela, the wife of career soldier Benito, has discovered a surreal fantasy world to help her cope with his long absences. There, where the moon plays the violin and a cat dances with coyotes, are the poetry and passion she misses in "real" life.

A wealthy woman invites two strangers to join her in a strange feast commemorating the death of her parents. Mayannah has done this every year but her dark purpose remains unclear. All that will change tonight when two damaged souls find their way to her table. Taking place in a not-so-distant future, the sounds of a war-torn Los Angeles fill the air. Tensions rise, true colors are revealed and the main course is not the only thing with claws.

In the Bolivian jungle, Che Guevara is captured and held in a one-room schoolhouse. For two days neither the Bolivian President nor the U.S. State Department is able to decide Che's fate. The young schoolteacher of the village insists that she be given permission to speak to the famous revolutionary. Her conversations with Che—based on historical fact—are the heart of the play.

When Flora's fianceŽ breaks her heart, she vows never to fall for an unfaithful man again. Then she meets Eusebio, who sweeps her off her feet and off to America—away from her family and her familiar life in Puerto Rico. Thirty-nine years later, an angel visits Eusebio with a mysterious message that stirs up old secrets and causes Flora to question the life she has tirelessly built in a foreign land. Boleros for the Disenchanted is a bittersweet and ultimately uplifting story about the everyday reality of marriage and the often undignified struggle to hold on to love in the face of life's unexpected challenges.

"JoséŽ Rivera is out of the kitchen sink and into magical realism—that's the term the playwright uses to describe The Promise, a modern-day tale of love, death—and love beyond it . . . The Promise is about maturation, growth, about leaving superstition behind. It's also very concerned with the cultural genocide that's happening in Puerto Rico . . . They learn English in school, and the indigenous folklore is not taught . . . " —Janice Arkatov, Los Angeles Times