DEMENTIA REVIVAL (2010)
The Los Angeles Theatre Center
Written by Evelina Fernández
Directed by José Luis Valenzuela
Produced by the Latino Theater Company
Choreography by Urbanie Lucero
Scenic Design by Christopher Ash
Lighting Design by François-Pierre Couture
Costumes by Nikki Delhomme
Sound Design by John Zalewski
Musical Director Karl Carrasco
Music Played by "Fiesta"
Stage Manager Henry "Heno" Fernandez
Assistant Stage Manager Jessica Aguilar
Cast: Sal Lopez, Geoffrey Rivas, Evelina Fernandez, Lucy Rodriguez, Ralph Cole Jr., Danny De La Paz and Esperanza America
His name is Moises, but his friends call him Moe. He’s having a going away party because he’s dying of AIDS. He’s a theater artist working on a one man, uh….one woman show. He invites his closest friends over for his “going away for good” party, but his plans go awry when his best friend, who has given himself to the Lord, and his ex, who he hasn’t seen in 15 years, show up. All the while his alter ego, a torch singing drag queen, wants to take him for “the ride of his life.” When first produced in 2002, “Dementia” won the GLAAD Award for Outstanding Theater Production in Los Angeles, and garnered four Ovation Award nominations. Now back by popular demand, and more relevant than ever, this innovative play tackles topics taboo in the Latino community, including homosexuality, AIDS, teen pregnancy and euthanasia through the Latino Theater Company’s unique humor and style.
"José Luis Valenzuela's re-staging of the Latino Theater Company's acclaimed, 2002 production has lost none of its rousing panache or theatrical luster."
- LA Weekly
"...Geoffrey Rivas and Lucy Rodriguez as a longtime collaborator and his spouse, Danny de la Paz's childhood friend, and Esperanza America Ibarra's pregnant teenage niece are uniformly formidable. And when author Fernández tears into Moe's justifiably embittered ex-wife, "Dementia" enters searing territory, after choreographer Urbanie Lucero's group dances have sent everything giddily aloft."
-David C. Nichols