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Teatro documental Latinx

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Abstract

This chapter opens by examining the concept of ‘documentary theater’, illustrated through a scene from Zoot Suit by Luis Valdez. It provides a concise historical overview of the genre within the U.S.-Latinx context, beginning with projects like the New Deal Federal Theatre of the 1930s, which highlighted local stories, and John O'Neal's story circle method developed with the Free Southern Theater in 1963. The chapter also considers the impact of Brazilian Augusto Boal’s journalistic theater (1971). Following this, it reviews a range of recent documentary works, including Letters from Cuba (2000) by María Irene Fornés; Shelter (2016) by Marissa Chibas; 14 (2003) by José Casas; Caged (2020) by Jimmy Noriega; and Invasive Species (2023) by Maia Novi. The chapter concludes with a look at contemporary work from companies like NAKA Dance Theater.


Open access | Peer reviewed

Submitted: Nov. 13, 2024 | Accepted: Dec. 24, 2024 | Published Aug. 1, 2025 | Language: es

Keywords NAKA Dance Theater • Journalistic theater • Documentary theatre • Latinx theatre • Contemporary documentary theatre

Copyright © 2025 Debra Castillo. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-925-2/007


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