Abstract
In 2008, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival launched “American Revolutions: The United States History Cycle,” a project that commissioned and developed “new plays sprung from moments of change in United Stated history.” The first work in this series to be produced, Richard Montoya’s American Night: The Ballad of Juan José, premiered in 2010. Employing the conceit of a dream vision, Montoya constructs a madcap history lesson as the titular Mexican immigrant dozes off while studying for his impending U.S. citizenship test. In the dreamscape, Juan José encounters historical figures ranging from the recognizable (Teddy Roosevelt) to the obscure (Viola Pettus), as well as fictional characters, who recast the history that Juan José is expected to know in order to secure his green card. Montoya’s vaudevillian mash-up of past and present, fact and fiction, reception and production challenges the stability of historical narratives and uses comedy to “[illuminate] our world from perspectives unattainable by ‘serious’ means.” This dramaturgical framework reaches its apex in the penultimate scene, when characters such as Anglo Woman in Audience and African-American Audience Member insert themselves into Juan José’s story. Here Montoya’s phenomenological historiography crystallizes; the meta-theatrical disruption positions the present as a critical “moment of [potential] change” in which viewers are not merely observers but co-authors of both the historical fiction of Juan José’s quest for the American Dream and real-world conversations about immigration, civic discourse, and national identity unfolding in real-time.
Presenters
Margaret F SavilonisAssociate Professor, Coordinator of Theater Arts, Coordinator of Interdisciplinary Studies B.A., English, Theater Arts & Interdisciplinary Studies, University of New Haven, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Conceptual, Frameworks, Identity, Difference
Digital Media
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