Birthday in the Bronx

A New York high school play in the ‘80s, but covered in mud.

Birthday in the Bronx is a theatrical piece based off of one real woman’s life.

Raquel, the real woman, grew up in the South Bronx and received a fancy scholarship to go to a pretty much all-white prep school where “presidents are made.” This work is part docu-theatre —incorporating interviews between Raquel and her boyfriend, the playwright, Paul — and part experimental theatre. The fictional “Rocky” is, like the real Raquel, a first generation Puerto Rican girl from the Bronx.

The form and content of the play asks questions like “Who controls the narrative?” and “What does agency look like?” and “Does Rocky need saving?”