Marisela Treviño Orta
{{short description|American dramatist}}
{{use mdy dates |date=February 2024}}
{{Infobox person
|name = Marisela Treviño Orta
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|education = Southwestern University {{small|(BA)}}
University of San Francisco {{small|(MFA)}}
University of Iowa {{small|(MFA)}}
}}
Marisela Treviño Orta is a third-generation Mexican-American playwright and poet from Lockhart, Texas.{{cite web |url=http://aszym.blogspot.com/2011/01/i-interview-playwrights-part-310.html |title=I Interview Playwrights Part 310: Marisela Treviño Orta |first=Adam |last=Szymkowicz|date=28 January 2011 |access-date=21 February 2024}} She attended the University of San Francisco where she received an MFA in Writing.{{cite web |url=http://howlround.com/authors/marisela-orta |title=Marisela Treviño Orta |website=HowlRound |publisher=Emerson College |access-date=21 February 2024}} While she was trained in poetry, Treviño Orta began writing plays after becoming the resident poet for El Teatro Jornalero!, a Latino theatre company which focuses on social justice issues.{{cite web |url=http://howlround.com/coffee-and-chat-marisela-trevi-o-orta |title=Coffee and Chat: Marisela Treviño Orta |first=Abel |last=Muñoz |website=HowlRound |publisher=Emerson College |date=27 October 2015 |access-date=21 February 2024}}
Career
Marisela Treviño Orta was first attracted to theatre and playwriting during her time as the resident poet at El Teatro Jornalero!. She was attracted to the theatre community, as she found poetry was often a lonely craft. Additionally, she found it was easier to explore political and social justice themes in playwriting, which she could not do in her poetry.
The playwright found immediate success with her first play Braided Sorrow, which won the 2006 Chicano/Latino Literary Prize in Drama, and the 2009 Pen Center USA Literary Award in Drama. This play was accepted into the 2005 Bay Area Playwrights Festival and officially premiered at Su Teatro in Denver, CO. Since then, she has written other successful plays including Heart Shaped Nebula (2012 O’Neill Playwrights Conference Semi-Finalist, 2013 Aurora Theatre Global Age Project Finalist), American Triage (2012 MetLife Nuestras Voces National Playwriting Runner-Up), which was a commissioned by Marin Theatre Company, and Woman on Fire, which was commissioned by the Latino Playwrights Initiative.{{cite web |url=https://newplayexchange.org/users/148/marisela-trevi%C3%B1o-orta |title=Marisela Treviño Orta |website=New Play Exchange |publisher=National New Play Network |access-date=21 February 2024}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.brava.org/marisela-trevio-orta|title=Marisela Treviño Orta|website=Brava for Women in the Arts|language=en-US|access-date=2019-09-28}} Treviño Orta was awarded the 2013 National Latino Playwriting Award for The River Bride, and most recently was a 2018/2019 Kendeda Finalist (Alliance Theatre) for Shoe.{{Cite web|url=https://alliancetheatre.org/content/winners-finalists|title=Winners & Finalists |website=Alliance Theatre|access-date=21 February 2024}} She is a 2011 alumna of the Playwright Foundation's Resident Playwright's Initiative and a graduate of the University of Iowa’s Playwrights Workshop.{{cite web |url=https://www.dramatistsguild.com/memberdirectory/getmembership.aspx?cid=39863 |title=Membership Profile: Marisela Treviño Orta |website=Dramatists Guild |publisher=Dramatists Guild of America |access-date=2 December 2015 |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20151222163437/https://www.dramatistsguild.com/memberdirectory/getmembership.aspx?cid=39863 |archive-date=22 December 2015}}
Most recently,{{when|date=August 2022}} Treviño Orta authored a trilogy of plays inspired by Latinx mythology{{Cite web|url=https://50playwrights.org/2016/04/07/marisela-trevino-orta-2/|title=Marisela Treviño Orta|last=trevorboffone|date=2016-04-07|access-date=21 February 2024 |website=50 Playwrights Project}} and the Brothers Grimm fairy tales. The River Bride, the first of the three, is set in Brazil and is inspired by Amazonian folklore and premiered February 21, 2016 at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.{{Cite web|url=https://www.osfashland.org/productions/2016-plays/the-river-bride.aspx|title=The River Bride|access-date=21 February 2024 |website=Oregon Shakespeare Festival}} The second, Wolf at the Door, which is currently featured in National New Play Network's Rolling World Premieres program, is set in Mexico and focuses on Mesoamerican belief.{{Cite web|url=http://nnpn.org/programs/rolling-world-premieres|title=Rolling World Premieres |website=National New Play Network|access-date=2019-09-28 |archive-url=http://web.archive.org/web/20191019180457/http://nnpn.org/programs/rolling-world-premieres/ |archive-date=19 October 2019}} Alcira, the trilogy's conclusion, is set in San Francisco and based on Aztec mythology.
Involvement in the theatre community
Treviño Orta is currently a member of the Dramatists Guild, the Latinx Theatre Commons, and is a founding member of the Bay Area Latino Theatre Artists Network.{{Cite web|url=https://www.goodmantheatre.org/Artists-Archive/creative-partners/playwrights/Marisela-Trevino-Orta/|title=Marisela Treviño Orta |website=Goodman Theatre|access-date=21 February 2024}}
Works
- Braided Sorrow{{Cite web|url=https://newplayexchange.org/plays/623/braided-sorrow|title =Braided Sorrow by Marisela Treviño Orta |website=New Play Exchange |access-date=21 February 2024}}
- Heart Shaped Nebula{{cite web |url=https://shotgunplayers.org/Online/heartshapednebula |title=Shotgun Players Present Heart Shaped Nebula |website=Shotgun Players |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150906234002/https://shotgunplayers.org/Online/heartshapednebula |archive-date=2015-09-06}}
- The River Bride
- American Triage{{Cite web|url=https://newplayexchange.org/plays/644/american-triage|title = American Triage by Marisela Treviño Orta |website=New Play Exchange |access-date=21 February 2024}}
- Woman on Fire
- Wolf at the Door{{cite web |url=http://events.uiowa.edu/event/wolf_at_the_door_-_iowa_new_play_festival_2016#.WTNjOTO-LR0 |title=Wolf at the Door - Iowa New Play Festival 2016 |publisher=University of Iowa |website=Events Calendar |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160407203905/http://events.uiowa.edu/event/wolf_at_the_door_-_iowa_new_play_festival_2016 |archive-date=2016-04-07}}
- Alcira{{cite web |url=https://events.uiowa.edu/event/alcira_-_iowa_new_play_festival_2017#.WTNjBjO-LR0 |title=Alcira - Iowa New Play Festival 2017 |publisher= University of Iowa |website=Events Calendar |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170402220751/https://events.uiowa.edu/event/alcira_-_iowa_new_play_festival_2017 |archive-date=2017-04-02}}
- Ghost Limb{{Cite web|url=https://www.brava.org/all-events/2017/7/6/ghost-limb|title = Ghost Limb |website=Brava |access-date=21 February 2024 |date=July 2017}}
- Somewhere{{cite web |url=https://newplayexchange.org/plays/409350/somewhere |title=Somewhere by Marisela Treviño Orta |website=New Play Exchange |access-date=21 February 2024}}
Awards and recognition
References
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Category:Year of birth missing (living people)
Category:American women dramatists and playwrights
Category:American writers of Mexican descent
Category:Hispanic and Latino American dramatists and playwrights
Category:21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
Category:21st-century American women writers
Category:People from Lockhart, Texas