History
The Latinx Playwrights Circle (LPC) started as a "pop up" Playwright Circle in October 2017. Since 2018, the group has been spearheaded and organized by playwrights Guadalís Del Carmen and Oscar A. L. Cabrera with Janio Marrero serving as the Executive Director. Programming began with a monthly meeting of playwrights committed to community development of their plays. In 2020, the LPC became a 501c3 non-profit and launched its first season of digital programming and community events. Recent programs like the Greater Good Commission & Festival and The Intensive Mentorship Program were important milestones that achieved national audiences of thousands online. Their mission is to build a network of LatinX Playwrights nationwide in order to promote, develop and elevate their work while making their plays accessible to theater makers looking to find the next generation of American Storytellers. With New York as their headquarters, they are a national network of committed playwrights of Latinx heritage of all racial and class backgrounds. They are currently in residence at Kabayitos Theater in the Clemente Soto-Velez Cultural and Education Center. The organization operates with a volunteer staff of seven playwrights serving one hundred and two-hundred members and supporters. According to the Asian American Peformer’s Action Coalition’s 2018 - 2019 report, 29.1% of New York City’s population identified as Latinx. However, only 0.5% of writers produced in New York City (Broadway and non-profit theaters combined) identified as Latinx. By contrast, 32.1% of people in NYC identify as white, but 80.5% of plays produced in NYC were written by white playwrights. Their aim is to deepen and increase the participation of and inclusion of Latinx playwrights in the American theater landscape.
Due to theater closures throughout the pandemic, LPC had to reimagine visibility for its members and their plays. LPC’s pivot to virtual programming provided a strong showcase of work by underrepresented Latinx playwrights to industry professionals nationwide as exemplified in the Greater Good Commission and Festival (GGCF), a flagship program conceived as a way to provide monetary relief to playwrights who were most vulnerable due to the pandemic. GGCF offers short play commissions and virtual festival productions to playwrights from historically excluded groups within the Latinx theater community such as Afro/Black-Latinx, LGBTQIA+ Latinx, and disabled Latinx playwrights, etc... In support of the Black Mutual Aid fund, LPC also produced a virtual dance party fundraiser to provide further COVID-19 relief to the community. LPC’s relief and recovery efforts also focused on the mental health of its members. Free, virtually accessible community engagement and audience building programs were also crucial ways for their members to foster creativity and combat isolation during the pandemic. For more information on NYC Latinx Playwright Circle, visit http://www.latinxplaywrights.com/, the group can also be found on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/latinxplaywrights/