Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Sotto Voce (TCG Edition)
    Sotto Voce (TCG Edition)
    Sotto Voce (TCG Edition)
    Ebook73 pages54 minutes

    Sotto Voce (TCG Edition)

    By Nilo Cruz

    4.5/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    The world premiere was a commission from Theater for the New City (New York) in winter 2014, directed by Cruz to much critical acclaim.

    Received a subsequent production at the On.Stage Black Box in Miami in spring 2014, produced by Cruz’s Florida-based theatre company Arca Images. Received rave reviews by Miami critics.

    A dream-like play, it’s an experimental style that deals with historical tragedy and unconventional romance; poetic dialogue and enthralling imagery.

    Interesting historical context that could appeal to academic audiences, as a well a cultural appeal to both Latino and Jewish audiences.

    Legendary theatre director Peter Brook reportedly plans to stage a French-version of Sotto Voce in Paris sometime in Fall 2015

    Cruz won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Anna in the Tropics, becoming the first Latino writer ever to do so.

    One of three playwrights to receive the Greenfield Prize, which consists of a $30,000 commission to create a new work of art to be fulfilled by the artist in two years.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTheatre Communications Group
    Release dateMay 30, 2016
    ISBN9781559368346
    Sotto Voce (TCG Edition)

    Read more from Nilo Cruz

    Related to Sotto Voce (TCG Edition)

    Related ebooks

    Ethnic Studies For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Pain And Love In The Backyard

      Feb 25, 2020

      In Will Arbery’s new play, five conservative Catholics in Wyoming gather late at night by a fire pit to argue, commiserate, and face the uncertain future of their faith and their country. Danya Taymor, who directed the play’s premiere at New York Cit

      8 min read

    • Article

      “Where Did You Laugh?”

      Dec 14, 2019

      “Where Did You Laugh?”
      4 min read

    • Article

      Mfa Or The Highway?

      Dec 25, 2019

      FOR YEARS, I IDENTIFIED AS A PLAY ‑ wright who wanted an MFA. I had seen those coveted three letters in almost every playwright’s bio, often attached to an illustrious university—an Ivy, or maybe a West Coast equivalent. I spent three autumns writing

      12 min read

    • Article

      Greater Clements

      Apr 27, 2020

      Greater Clements
      88 min read

    • Article

      Qui Nguyen Finds a Home in Orange County

      Apr 2, 2019

      As a playwright, I’m a little bit ADD artistically,” says Qui Nguyen. “I get bored really quickly. I put things in there that are kind of wild, just to keep myself entertained.” Nguyen’s breakthrough play, Vietgone, illustrates exactly what he’s talk

      5 min read

    • Article

      My 21st-century Touchstone Play: Theatre Stars Share The Shows That Shook Them To The Core

      Feb 19, 2021

      Here at the Evening Standard, we recently tried to pull together the 21st-century’s greatest plays (read our list and see if you agree). But what about those plays that impact us more personally, that seem to speak to us directly and leave us getting

      7 min read

    • Article

      Polly Stenham

      Jun 4, 2016

      Polly Stenham
      1 min read

    • Article

      Carrie Coon Has Drawn Acclaim for Her TV Work, but Her Return to Theater in 'Mary Jane' Brings a Welcome Clarity of Character

      Oct 27, 2017

      NEW YORK - You can tell by the way Carrie Coon confidently maneuvers around the tables of a crowded Tribeca restaurant that this is an actress who has hit her stride. She recently completed two tours of television duty, receiving acclaim for her work

      6 min read

    • Article

      Critic's Notebook: Star Turns That Serve The Broadway Play — Elaine May, Daniel Radcliffe And Janet McTeer Show How It's Done

      Nov 26, 2018

      NEW YORK - When it comes to playwriting, Broadway has a supply problem. Although the new generation of American dramatists is blazingly talented, the great majority of these writers prefer the creative flexibility of more intimate stages. New dramas

      6 min read

    • Article

      An ‘Inheritance’ Deferred

      Oct 25, 2019

      An ‘Inheritance’ Deferred
      8 min read

    • Article

      Suzan-Lori Parks

      Apr 15, 2019

      The Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright on adapting classics, the black avant-garde and how much of the world is a stage

      2 min read

    • Article

      Onstage March 19

      Feb 25, 2019

      Onstage March 19
      26 min read

    • Article

      Black Stage Report

      Feb 25, 2019

      Black Stage Report
      15 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Sotto Voce (TCG Edition)

    4.5/5

    3 ratings1 review

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 5/5
      This story was beautiful. It's one of my favorite plays.

    Book preview

    Sotto Voce (TCG Edition) - Nilo Cruz

    Act One

    As the lights begin to dim, we hear the cries of seagulls and the constant sound of a ship’s horn in a harbor. Then, in full darkness, we hear the sound of someone writing on a computer keyboard and the amplified recorded voice of a woman. The sounds become an echo.

    Projected on the curtain is an image of the ocean.

    BEMADETTE (Recorded voice): Ariel and Nina Strauss boarded the St. Louis ship, Saturday, May 13, 1939. They had left Hamburg with thoughts of starting a new life away from Germany and finding a new home in Havana.

    (The lights reveal Bemadette.)

    (Spoken voice) I wanted to be on the ship with them, but I clenched my toes inside my shoes to keep from running up the gangway, as I stood immobile on the dock, drenched in my coat with the desire to leave with Ariel, while the air around me became still.

    (A phone rings. The lights reveal Saquiel, a young man dressed in a leather coat. Bemadette picks up the phone without speaking.)

    SAQUIEL: Hello? Bemadette?

    (No answer from Bemadette.)

    Are you there?

    BEMADETTE: Yes.

    SAQUIEL: It’s me. Saquiel.

    BEMADETTE: No, you’re not Saquiel. That’s not the name I gave you. You’re Ariel Strauss.

    SAQUIEL: I’m leaving—

    BEMADETTE: Do you have to remind me?

    SAQUIEL: No. But from the beginning I told you my visit would be short.

    BEMADETTE: Yes. It isn’t the first time you tell me this.

    SAQUIEL: But you never believed me—

    BEMADETTE: No. I thought I had dreamt it.

    SAQUIEL: My visa expired—

    BEMADETTE (Playfully): My dear young man, you could have lied to me—

    SAQUIEL: Lied—?

    BEMADETTE: Yes.

    SAQUIEL: How?

    BEMADETTE: By easing the moment.

    SAQUIEL: Is that what you want me to do?

    BEMADETTE: I thought you would know by now—

    SAQUIEL: Know what—?

    BEMADETTE: To lie to me.

    SAQUIEL: If I knew how to lie to you I would.

    BEMADETTE: It would help me forget that you’re leaving.

    SAQUIEL: I think it’s too late now.

    BEMADETTE: It’s never too late. Something is always beginning.

    SAQUIEL: What could begin now?

    BEMADETTE: What we have to say to each other one last time.

    SAQUIEL: The sound of good-bye?

    BEMADETTE: That’s also a beginning. You mustn’t forget to take a look at Central Park one last time.

    SAQUIEL: With you?

    BEMADETTE: No, by yourself. I’m not leaving. I don’t need to see it one last time.

    SAQUIEL: I only know how to go there with you.

    BEMADETTE (Her expression is childlike): In the end there’s nothing to it. We only have to close our eyes and enter Central Park.

    SAQUIEL: Were my eyes to close now, I’d be waiting for you there.

    BEMADETTE: In what part of the park?

    SAQUIEL: Where I always like to sit.

    BEMADETTE: By the statue of the Cuban poet, José Martí.

    SAQUIEL: And we’d visit the park with the specter of the poet.

    BEMADETTE: The three of us like ghosts.

    SAQUIEL: Yes. And he’d show us the trees he used to know in the park.

    BEMADETTE: The last trees to drop their leaves in the fall.

    SAQUIEL: And the ones to bloom first . . .

    BEMADETTE: Of course, he would’ve known all the trees.

    SAQUIEL: And so did Walt Whitman . . .

    BEMADETTE: And Edith Wharton . . .

    SAQUIEL: Bemadette, I must go. I have to go.

    BEMADETTE (Suddenly, desperately but quietly): Don’t go yet! Don’t go, Saquiel!

    SAQUIEL: Do you realize that if I don’t leave I might not be allowed to come back?

    (She doesn’t respond.)

    Bemadette. Are you there? Would you read my letters when I write to you?

    BEMADETTE: I’d much rather hear your voice—

    SAQUIEL: That’s not what I asked you—

    BEMADETTE: I know—

    SAQUIEL: Good-bye then—

    (Sound of a dial tone. Bemadette is unable to end the phone call. The lights go down on Saquiel.)

    BEMADETTE: How did I spend these same hours the past years without his voice?

    How did I get myself into this? How did it begin?

    (Lights change. Bemadette takes us back to the initial conversation that occurred a month ago with Saquiel.

    The telephone rings. The answering machine picks up the call. Lights up on Saquiel.)

    SAQUIEL: Ms. Kahn . . . Ms. Kahn . . . it’s me, Saquiel, the student from Cuba. Don’t hang up. It doesn’t matter if you don’t talk to me. You don’t have to tell me a

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1