Three generations of outrageous women confront each other in a family mausoleum: that is the premise of Aurora Theatre’s Teatro Aurora production of El Gran Día de la Madre,
a new comedy by Chascas y Quintanilla to be performed in the intimate
Aurora Studio. With Chilean and Spanish co-authors, the show has
delighted audiences on two continents, premiering in Chile in 2012
followed by a production in Spain in 2014. Additionally, the show is a
part of the celebrated GGC Harvel Lab Series and will be performed in
Spanish with English supertitles.
“I am looking at our play as a classic French
farce, but without the three doors,” explains show director Daniel
Jáquez. “Each door instead is replaced with an unbelievable revelation
that would devastate anyone, but there is this underlying love that
yields a lot of surprises. In a French farce if something goes wrong,
you storm out the door, and when you want to say something, you barge
in... here we are confined in a mausoleum literally surrounded by our
ancestors.”
The play follows Violeta, her daughter Cotillón and
granddaughter Prudencia, all keepers of dark secrets. The trio have a
great Mother’s Day reckoning, in a most unlikely location – the family
mausoleum – in this rollicking comedy. As a result, these women of
different generations celebrate this explosive holiday with love, tears
and, most importantly, a big dose of laughter.
El Gran Día de la Madre is under the direction of the acclaimed Daniel Jáquez. Mr
Jáquez earned an M.F.A. in Directing from American Repertory
Theater/Harvard/MXAT and a B.S. in Mathematics from the University of
Texas, residing in New York City for almost 30 years and relocating to
San Diego in 2016. Aurora Theatre is thrilled to bring an artist of his
caliber to the project at the helm of three formidable leading ladies.
The cast includes Teatro Aurora favorites Irma Cristancho as Violeta and Limara Meneses Jimenez as Prudencia. Making her Aurora debut is Joselin Reyes as Cotillon, whose face will be familiar to audiences from her appearances on hit television shows like Law & Order, Law & Order: SVU, The Sopranos and Scrubs,
where she played Gabriella Espinosa, the sister of her real-life twin
Judy Reyes who portrayed the popular nurse Carla Espinosa on the hit
sitcom.
El Gran Día de la Madre is presented at Aurora Theatre, April 6 – April 29, 2018. Tickets can be purchased for $20-$30 online at tickets.auroratheatre.com or by calling the Box Office at 678-226-6222. For more information on this production or other programming, please visit auroratheatre.com.
Show times are as follows:
- Thursday – Saturday: 8 p.m.
- Sunday: 2:30 p.m.
