Rogelio Martinez is an award-winning playwright whose plays have been workshopped and produced in theaters across the U.S. and abroad. He has just returned from Germany were a workshop of his play, Born In East Berlin, was performed at the Stasi Museum, Berlin in both English and German. The play is scheduled to be produced at the San Francisco Playhouse in February 2020.
Martinez’s play, Blind Date, was produced at the Goodman Theatre under the direction of Tony nominee Robert Falls. The play starred Tony Award winning actress Deanna Dunagan as Nancy Reagan. Her performance received a Joseph Jefferson Award nomination. Blind Date was awarded an Edgerton Foundation New Play Award. This is the second time his work has received an Edgerton Foundation New Play Award. Blind Date was one of only two plays awarded a Citation of Excellence by the Laurents / Hatcher Foundation.
Martinez is a recipient of a 2017 Guggenheim Fellowship. Martinez is also the winner of a Princess Grace Award, and a Mid-Career Fellowship at the Lark Theater Company. In the past he has received grants and awards from the New York Foundation for the Arts Grant, NEA/ TCG, and the James Hammerstein Award among others.
After being awarded an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation New Science and Technology Initiative Grant by the Denver Center, Martinez went on to write When Tang Met Laika, a post Cold War space exploration play; which was subsequently produced by the Denver Center. This inspired Martinez to bring the Cold War itself on stage and write a three play cycle exploring the time period.
The first play in his Cold War trilogy is Ping Pong. The play is about U.S.-Chinese relations during the Nixon administration. It was presented at the Public Theatre as part of their Public Studio program and later published by Broadway Play Publishing.
Born in East Berlin, the second play, tackled the impact a Springsteen concert had on East Germans just prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall. The play was workshopped at the Atlantic Theater Company and has since been translated into Hungarian, Romanian, and German.
The trilogy’s conclusion is Blind Date. It was originally commissioned by the Denver Center Theater Company.
Martinez has been workshopped and commissioned by various theaters across the country including the Public Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Mark Taper Forum, South Coast Repertory, Atlantic Theater Company, Arden Theater, Asolo Repertory, and Ojai Theater Company, and many more. His plays include Illuminating Veronica, Arrivals and Departures, and All Eyes and Ears (all published by Broadway Play Publishing). His newest play is Come As You Are, a play with music. The play was commissioned by Shadowcatcher Productions and has received several developmental workshops.
For several years Martinez was a member of the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writer’s Group at Primary Stages. He is an alumnus of New Dramatists.
As an advocate of the arts and an educator, Martinez has spoken before the Albany State legislature. He has worked with and mentored writers of all ages including high school kids. He teaches graduate level playwriting at Columbia University and undergraduate playwriting at NYU. In the summer of 2016, he travelled to Portugal where he taught a two-week playwriting workshop.
Martinez has been a guest editor for Clockworks Magazine. He was an actor in the film Exiles in New York, which played at the A.F.I Film Festival, South by South West, The Santa Barbara Film Festival and The Latin American International Film Festival in Havana, Cuba.
Martinez has written for children’s television and has just finished writing two scripts for an upcoming show on Nickelodeon.
Martinez has translated the work of both Mexican and Cuban playwrights.
Martinez was born in Sancti-Spiritus, Cuba and came to the U.S. on the Mariel boatlift in 1980.
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Originally published: Thursday, January 16, 2020.
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