World Premiere
Written by Enrique Urueta
Directed by Mary Guzmán
Feb 18–Apr 2 | All performances 8pm | Directions

Tickets: $12 & $17 advance | $15 & $20 at the door

About the play

Hanan is a promising young pop singer, and she has a record label dying to record her...until they find out she's Lebanese. Not to worry, they say: Hanan can still be a star—as long as she learns to be Latina! In this fiercely funny world-premiere production from local badass Enrique Urueta, cultural identities and the music business are poked with some very, very sharp sticks. The award-winning Mary Guzmán, who helmed Latina's first incarnation as a one-act, returns to direct this full-length production. The SF Weekly’s Chloe Veltman wrote of the one-act, “Latina delivers a serious message about racial stereotyping in the pop music industry through zany, stylized theatrics.” Don't miss what is sure to be the most blistering comedy to play the Bay Area this season.

Featuring Andrew Calabrese, Melanie Salazar Case, Marilet Martinez, Jon Nagel, Carlye Pollack, and Emily Rosenthal

Reviews

The Little Man is clapping! "Hilariously graphic... crude and rude in a manner that tickles ribs well beyond the comfort zone... Urueta and director Mary Guzmán pull out all the stops to laugh, dance and wrestle all kinds of identity issues to the ground... knockout-silly dance numbers... the kind of wild romp that stimulates almost as much thought as laughter."—SF Chronicle (read full review)

"A smart, insightful, sexy and consistently hilarious story set amid a flurry of racist, sexist and homophobic slurs...the play's merciless off-color fun brilliantly illuminates without a hint of sententiousness the bogus values in market-driven multiculturalism."—SF Bay Guardian (full review not available online)

"Explosively funny, entertainingly offensive...every casting choice works...the play is as full of quotable lines as any show I've watched in recent memory...Urueta is, in other words, an extravagantly talented comic playwright...I can't remember any play in which I found myself mouthing the words 'Oh my God' with quite so much frequency."—SF Weekly (read full review)

"An often screamingly funny show offering a heaping helping of 'oh no he didn’t'...it’s sure to be a hit"—The Idiolect (read full review)

"Controversial yet profound...poignant and original...[Urueta's] hilarious wordplay [makes] nearly every line quotable"—Daily Cal (read full review)

"Revels in racial stereotypes and postmodernism...Impact specializes in self-consciously hip plays with obscene humor, and Learn to Be Latina could be the gold standard...It takes a clever group of actors to carry that type of script, and fortunately, this cast rises to the occasion"—East Bay Express (read full review)

Hanan's Music Video!

Production Sponsors

The Phyllis C. Wattis Foundation
Theatre Bay Area's CA$H Grant Program
The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
The Zellerbach Family Foundation

Poster lettering courtesy of Photo-Lettering, Inc.
Music video song licensed from iStockAudio