(lively music) - Good evening and welcome to "Horizonte," a show that takes a look at current issues through a Hispanic lens.

I'm your host, Catherine Anaya.

Tonight, we hear the amazing story of a woman who was writing plays in Mexico before this country was even formed.

Not only was Sor Juana Inés de La Cruz, the first female playwright in Mexico, but she was the first woman playwright in all of the New World.

By the age of three, she was reading and writing in Latin.

Hailed as a hero of Mexican letters and culture, she was nicknamed "The Phoenix of America" by her contemporary critics.

Her play, "House of Desires," was written in 1683, examining the role of women in a time when they had to follow some strict moral codes in society.

Here to tell us more about the playwright and her play, coming to Scottsdale, is Grant Mudge, executive director of Southwest Shakespeare Company.

Nice to have you here.

- Thank you for having me.

Great to be here.

- Thank you.

So, 30th anniversary season.

Congratulations.

- Pretty exciting, yes.

- That is very exciting.

Let's talk about the longevity of the Shakespeare Company here in the Valley.

- Sure.

- It's been in the community for a long time and very successful.

- Yeah, across the Valley, around the state.

Most of it, of course, prior to my arrival.

I'm in the sort of still new category.

But, it was fun to watch while operating other Shakespeare companies in the country to kind of see how things were going back home.

I grew up in the Valley and so it's been a great homecoming.

- Yes, welcome home.

- Thank you.

- So, it is called the Shakespeare Company, but you don't just focus on Shakespeare, hence, "House of Desires," which we're gonna talk about tonight.

- Sure.

He's certainly the touchstone playwright, if you will, and we'll return to Shakespeare every season.

The era immediately following him or preceding Shakespeare's plays, also, I think, gives us insights into our own time period.

So, that's one of the reasons to look at other playwrights and some female ones, especially.

- Yes, so we're talking about "House of Desires."

Now, that was written by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, considered the first woman playwright, as I mentioned, in Mexico.

She is the first published feminist of the New World and is considered a national, I should say, icon of Mexico, which commemorated her on the 200 peso bill.

Pretty remarkable.

Almost entirely self-taught.

How much of her work did you know about, were you familiar about, before you decided to showcase her play?

- Yeah, very little.

And that's been one of the terrific outpourings of the recent discovery of plays for me of unknown, previously to me, certainly, Sor Juana's plays are included in that.

"House of Desires," especially, through the great translation from Catherine Boyle.

And it came through a program called Expand the Canon, which is run by some colleagues across the country.

That led to just a read of the play and I loved it.

And then learning more about Sor Juana's story.

Of course, where we are, I love the nickname, "The Phoenix of America."

And this was that sense of New Spain was where we are now.

It was part...

This is certainly pre-independence, and I think that era, the connection to the playwright, all together very well fit with our final play.

And I won't get into that too much, but that's Molière.

They're at the same time, and the plays echo one another, too.

- Well, "House of Desires," for people who aren't familiar with it, looks at the role of women during a time when they had to follow some very strict moral codes in societies and mentioned earlier.

Why was this particular play chosen at this particular time to be on stage?

- Why this play?

Why now?

That's a great question.

We don't think of 1600s being a main century for lots of feminism.

I think that that alone was enough to say, "Let's highlight this play and bring it to the stage."

Secondly, it's a tremendously fun script.

And that's reason number two, always, is the audience gonna have a great time or the actor's gonna be challenged?

Her language is phenomenal.

But then I think the final layer is here was a woman writing from a convent, and scholars tend to agree, she arguably wrote herself into the play in the character of Doña Leonora, and, essentially, forced the world to see her.

It was an incredibly popular play, and her works were popular and read quite a lot.

Her hometown is outside Mexico City and is renamed for her now.

So, popular in her day and well-known today, and celebrated as a hero of letters.

It seemed all wound together quite nicely.

It felt topical too, certainly, to see that that voice brought to the stage now seemed very important.

- And it is fascinating that something as relevant in the 1600s is still relevant today, right?

- We do a lot of that at the Shakespeare Company.

It's true whether that's 400 years ago as our primary playwright, but when you read this in translation or the little bits that I've been able to read in Spanish, it's readily accessible to us.

It doesn't seem as if it's language from another period, or impenetrable, or impossible to understand.

Quite the contrary.

It's very funny.

The actors are often turning directly to the audience and engaging with them on the sides.

- Well, that was probably not how it was written.

So, there are some differences with how it's produced on stage versus how it was written?

- Well, the asides would've been very much a part of how theater was staged, both in what would become Mexico and in a more European setting.

We would've had actors and audience in the same light, for example, and within the same room.

There was no no dimming of the electrical lights before the play began, and so, actors were very aware of the audience directly there, so too, were the playwrights.

So, as her characters express what they can't say to each other, they can to us, and we're very familiar with that in the world of Shakespeare, and so, those two connected quite nicely.

- Well, it becomes a lot more intimate that way too, right?

- You can't miss what's going on if an actor on stage is turning right to you and saying, "What should I do in this moment?

He can't come into this room or he'll see my brother."

- So, there's this intimacy, there's relevant subjects, there's comedy.

What are you hoping that people will walk away from "House of Desires," thinking, feeling emotionally?

- Yeah, it's almost impossible to distill fully, and the experience of the play will do so.

But, if I had to boil it down, I think it's about that 350-year lens into female agency and a declared voice in her world when the typically male authorities of the Catholic Church tried to restrict her intellectual output and her writings, she fought back, and through the very same works of which this play is a part.

And her phrase, essentially, was, "God gave women intellect to use it."

And I think that as much as we enjoy the fun of the comedy, and it is, it's very funny, there's an ability to look at who we are today as a people, as a species, and who we were multiple centuries ago.

And I think that that resonates with us.

I know folks will be able to spot something new and themselves, perhaps, in the characters that they'll see on stage.

- Not to mention if they weren't familiar with her work before, this is a great way to be educated on a fabulous, remarkable woman.

We've talked about some of what she had experienced younger self taught, but she was also a nun.

- Yeah.

And entirely self-educated until the age of 21.

- Remarkable.

- Indigenous languages, Latin, taught other students younger than herself.

Truly remarkable.

Passed away at the age of 46, which makes me feel like I'm not working hard enough.

- [Catherine] Very accomplished.

- She very much was.

- Yes.

- And that's reason enough I think, right there.

But, I'm delighted folks will get a chance to get to know her a little bit more.

- Well, I agree with you and I want to make sure that people know where they can see this.

It's "House of Desires" on stage April 11th through the 14th at Taliesin West Music Pavilion, that's in Scottsdale.

And for tickets, they are still available.

It's SWShakespeare.org or you can call the Mesa Arts Center Box Office.

Grant Mudge, thank you so much.

Looking forward to this, and, of course, your continued success.

30 years and going strong.

- My pleasure.

Thanks very much for having me.

- Yeah, good to see you.

And that's our show for tonight.

For "Horizonte" and Arizona PBS, I'm Catherine Anaya.

Thanks for joining us.

Have a great night.

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