Elisa Gonzales presents Olvidados: A Mexican American Corrido

Theatre artist Elisa Gonzales presents Olvidados: A Mexican American Corrido on November 17-18, 2023, 7:00 PM in CitySpace’s Blue Room at Old Town Hall at 43 Main St. Easthampton, MA. Tickets are $5 for students and seniors, $10 for other general admission.

Olvidados: A Mexican American Corrido, a one-woman play with music (by Elisa Gonzales, music and additional lyrics by Moises Vázquez), is about the many untold stories of the Repatriation, based on heart-wrenching true-life events. In 1931, as the Great Depression darkened America, a new xenophobia swept through the country, aimed at hundreds of thousands of Mexicans and their American-born children. In a solo performance that transcends time and space, we witness the Repatriation through the eyes of three courageous women spanning across several generations of a Mexican family, and the songs of a shape-shifting musician who immortalizes the immigrant experience through corridos. A 2022 Semi-Finalist for the Eugene O'Neill National Music Theatre Conference, Gonzales will present two public staged readings of the latest iteration of the play, followed by a moderated talkback after each presentation.

​Elisa’s greatest passion in theatre is creating and performing work that honors cultural identity, ancestry, history, and the voice. She is a Mexican-American theatre artist, playwright, actor, educator, and voice, speech, and dialect coach. Elisa is a certified teacher of Fitzmaurice Voicework® and Knight-Thompson Speechwork, and is the Assistant Professor of Voice and Acting in the Department of Theater at UMass Amherst. Elisa is a proud member of Actors' Equity Association, VASTA (the Voice and Speech Trainers Association), ATHE (Association for Theatre in Higher Education), the Dramatist's Guild, and NALAC (National Association for Latino Arts and Culture).

​Elisa received her MFA in Theatre Performance from Arizona State University, and has a BFA in Acting from Emerson College. Elisa’s work on and off-stage has been seen at the New York International Fringe Festival, the Nuyorican Poets Café, San Diego Repertory Theatre, Commonwealth Shakespeare Company, the La Jolla Playhouse, American Players Theatre, St. Louis Shakespeare Festival, Silverthorne Theatre Company, WAM Theatre, the Hangar Theatre Company, and the Phoenix Theatre Company, as well as colleges and universities across the country.

Elisa Gonzales is a Pay It Forward recipient.

Photo by Ben Barnhart.