Staged Readings for 2026

Teatro Nagual will produce two staged readings on new works by Latinx playwrights.

“The Man in the Maze” by Oliver Jai’Sen Mayer. Set in 1519, The Man in the Maze captures the moment when Hernán Cortés lands in the Yucatán Peninsula and desperately needs a trustworthy translator to navigate the complexities of the indigenous Mayan world. Enter Gonzo, a Spaniard who was shipwrecked a decade earlier and has since embraced Mayan culture. The play raises provocative questions: Has Gonzo become more Mayan than Spanish? Can he be trusted to interpret the language of conquest, or does he have a different vision of cultural intermixing, one free from violence and domination? This riveting play taps into the precise historical moment when the American identity was being shaped in ways that still resonate today.

The next stage reading will be “Randy’s Dandy Coaster Castle” by Alexander Perez.

It’s always a great day at Randy’s…unless you work there. Randy’s Dandy Coaster Castle takes its audience into the complicated and darkly comedic lives of five co-workers doing their best to hold a scrappy amusement park together. The highs and lows of working at “Randy’s” are no joke, but this little piece of life, detailing the experience of a day job that’s also killing you, is too funny and too relatable not to break your heart and leave you laughing through the cringe. Randy’s Dandy explores class, capitalism, and the American dream through the colorful lens of this deeply human group of people. 

Both of these will be presented in the summer of 2026