Luis Valdez
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Books by Luis Valdez
“Theatre of the Sphere: The Vibrant Being” (2021)
Theatre of the Sphere is Luis Valdez’s exploration of the principles that underlie his innovations as a playwright, teacher, and theatrical innovator. He discusses the unique aesthetic, more than five decades in the making, that defines the work of his group El Teatro Campesino―from shows staged on the backs of flatbed trucks by the participants in the Delano Grape Strike of the 1960s to international megahits like Zoot Suit.
“Mummified Deer and Other Plays” (2005)
For more than twenty years, Luis Valdez, the most distinguished Latino playwright and director, has reserved most of his scripts for live stage productions. His two landmark published collections, Early Works and Zoot Suit and Other Plays, are only a sampling of his early master works and of the later plays that made it to the stage in the 1980s. Now, Valdez has finally opened his trunk to release print editions of revised early works and a brand new, major drama.
“Zoot Suit and Other Plays” (1992)
Drama. Latino American Studies. Luis Valdez is a leading figure in Hispanic theater with outstanding achievements from a variety of venues from flatbed truck and conventional stages to the silver and small screens. With his many successes Valdez has remained a rebel and an innovator, as well as the re-creator of Hispanic traditions. This book contains three of the most important and critically acclaimed Valdez plays. "Zoot Suit" is a play that deals with the infamous "Pachuco Riots" in Los Angeles during World War II, Bandido! explores the life and legend of the nineteenth-century California social rebel Tiburcio Vasquez, and I Don't Have to Show You No Stinking Badges! explores media images of Hispanic through a staged recreation of the TV situation comedy genre.
“Early Works: Actos, Bernabe and Pensamiento Serpentino” (1990)
ARLY WORKS: ACTOS, BERNABE AND PENSAMIENTO SERPENTINE is three books in one: 1) a collection of one act plays by Valdez and the famous farmworker theater, El Teatro Campesino, 2) one of the first fully realized, full-length plays by Valdez alone, and 3) an original narrative poem by Luis Valdez. In the first part are collected the original, improvised works of El Teatro Campesino that deal with the exploitation of Mexican farm labor in the California fields, the discrimination found by Mexicans in the schools, and Mexicans being turned into cannon fodder by the U.S. Army in Vietnam. Bernabe is a touching, Lorcaesque poetic drama about a town fool's enchantment and ultimate unity with the earth. Pensamiento serpentino is a long, philosophical poem, based on Mayan thought and cosmology, which analyzes the cultural, religious and political circumstances of Mexican Americans and prepares a metaphysical framework for their future.
At a glanceLuis Valdez
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