sol 6: Guadalís Del Carmen

Guadalís Del Carmen
the playwright

Chicago born and bred Dominicana, Guadalís Del Carmen is an Ars Nova Resident Artist, a Black Lives Black Words Artistic Associate, and Co-Artistic Director of the Latinx Playwrights Circle NYC. Her plays include Not For Sale (Commission/World Premier UrbanTheater Company, Jeff Award New Play Nominee 2019), My Father’s Keeper (part of Steppenwolf Theatre’s The Mix, The Kilroys Honorable Mention 2019, Semi Finalist Bay Area Playwrights Festival 2018),  Bees and Honey (The Kilroys List 2019, 50 Playwrights Project Best Unproduced Latinx Plays 2019), Daughters of the Rebellion (formerly titled Tolstoy’s Daughters, World Premiere Montclair State University 2019, The Kilroys Honorable Mention 2017, 50 Playwrights Project Best Unproduced Latinx Plays 2017), A Shero’s Journey or What Anacaona and Yemayá Taught Me (Yale Magazine 2019, The Parsnip Ship Podcast Season 4), Blowout (World Premiere Aguijón Theater 2013), Sucking on Cucumbers, Blue Wall of Silence, Racial Science.

Her work has been part of The Sol Project’s SolFest: A Latinx Play Festival, the Latinx Theatre Commons Carnaval of New Latinx Work, and San Diego Repertory Theater’s Latinx New Play Festival. She has performed as an actor in Chicago, NYC, and most recently The Repertory of St. Louis in Luis Alfaro’s Mojada: A Medea in Los Angeles. 

BEES AND HONEY
THE PLAY

Inspired by the Juan Luis Guerra song "Como Abeja Al Panal," Bees and Honey is an intimate portrait of a Dominican couple's love and dreams in New York City. Manuel and Johaira meet at a Washington Heights club and it was love at first sight. Now married, the ambitious young couple set out to achive their dreams together. Manuel's entrepreneurial spirit drives him to expand his mechanic shop, while Johaira lands a career-defining sexual assault case that could help her make partner at her law firm. As the high-profile trial takes its toll on Johaira, she also begins to question whether her husband will ever outgrow his old school mentality. Adding in Manuel's ailing mother and an unforeseen tragedy, the pair must reckon with how their love is put to the test.

MCC THEATER
THE PARTNER

Founded in 1986 as Manhattan Class Company, MCC began as a collective of young actors, writers, and directors determined to steer their own artistic development and redefine the NYC theater scene with the kind of stories they wanted to see on the stage. That work continues today in Hell’s Kitchen at The Robert W. Wilson MCC Theater Space, a creative hotbed where our artists, staff, and students have the freedom to stir things up, all under one roof.

melissa crespo
the director

Melissa Crespo is CT born with Dominican, Puerto Rican and Chilean roots. She is a New York City based director of theater, opera and film. She most often directs world premieres and is also a producer, dramaturg and playwright.

Melissa has developed work at LAByrinth Theater Company, New Dramatists, The Lark and more. She is most known for ¡Figaro! (90210) which had it's world premiere at LA Opera and was produced twice Off-Broadway at The Duke on 42nd Street. Melissa also directed the most recent incarnation of Tar Baby written and performed by Desiree Burch with Dan Kitrosser. Hailed as one of Huffington Post's 'Favorite Female Comedians," Tar Baby was awarded the prestigious Scotsman Fringe First at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and has since had productions in NYC, London, New Zealand and Finland.

Melissa co-write the play Egress with Sarah Saltwick which recently had a workshop production at Cleveland Playhouse. It will receive a world premiere production May 2020 at Amphibian Stage in Fort Worth, TX. She is currently adapting Angie Cruz's novel Soledad for the stage.

Melissa has served as a 2016-2018 Time Warner Fellow at WP Theater, Allen Lee Hughes Directing Fellow at Arena Stage, Van Lier Directing Fellow at Second Stage Theatre and is an alum of the Drama League Director's Project. She is a current Usual Suspect at New York Theatre Workshop and received her MFA in Directing from The New School for Drama. 

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HIGHLIGHTS

MCC Theatre Announces 2022/2023 Season
BroadwayWorld | June 16th, 2022