¡BIENVENIDOS BLANCOS! OR WELCOME WHITE PEOPLE!

¡BIENVENIDOS BLANCOS! OR WELCOME WHITE PEOPLE! is a bilingual theatrical production that explores the role of “whiteness” and identity in the contemporary Cuban and Cuban-American experience. Produced by Philadelphia-based theatre company Team Sunshine Performance Corporation, and created through a multi-year collaboration between Cuban and American artists, BIENVENIDOS explores the impact that Cuba’s racial, economic, and political history has had on the lives of its people on and off the island. BIENVENIDOS attempts to capture the particularities of this impact, touching on themes of survival, immigration, and the diasporic experience, looking towards the past to understand the complexities of the present.

BIENVENIDOS premiered in Philadelphia in 2018 to critical and popular acclaim, receiving six Barrymore nominations, including Best New Play. In 2020, Team Sunshine will reunite the BIENVENIDOS creative team at Swarthmore College for a two-week residency that includes workshops and talks around the piece’s themes and including two public performances of the production featuring an Opening Act from rumba band TIMBALONA!

Performed in Spanish with English supertitles.

Director/Lead Artist: Alex Torra (Swathmore Dept of Theater)

Assistant Directors: Cheryl Zaldívar Jiménez and Rachel Camp

Choreographer: Makoto Hirano

Performer/Creators: Lori Felipe Barkin (‘12), Benjamin Camp (‘05), Jorge Enrique Caballero Elizarde, Jenna Horton, Cheryl Zaldívar Jiménez

Set Designer: Efren Delgadillo, Jr.

Costume Designer: Fabian Aguilar

Lighting Designer: Oona Curley

Sound Designer: Anthony Martinez-Briggs and Chris Sannino

Props Designer: Alicia Crosby

RELATED EVENTS:

Saturday Feb 8, 10:30-1:30pm
Location: Tarble in Clothier

Please click here to register.
 
Cuban performers Cheryl Zaldívar and Jorge Caballero will lead a 3-hour workshop/class that introduces students to the dance practices of el Folklórico, which is rooted in the embodiment and telling of the stories of the Orishas, the Yoruba deities central to the Afro-Cuban religion commonly known as Santeria.
 
Leaving Home/Staying Behind: A Public Conversation about Cuban Immigration (in Spanish)

Cuban performers Idalmis Garcia and Cheryl Zaldivar will participate in a public conversation about Cuban Immigration hosted by SPAN 008 (Spanish Conversation and Composition). Moderated by Professor Eli Cohen, this conversation will take place in Spanish and will focus on the complex personal experience of immigrating to the U.S. from Cuba from two perspectives: personal insight as a new Cuban immigrant in the U.S. and the experience of Cubans on the island who have watched generations leave.

Creating Theater Collaboratively and Cross-Culturally -- Team Sunshine Devised Theater Workshop

Hosted by THEA 012 (Acting II), Cuban performer Cheryl Zaldivar and Team Sunshine members Alex Torra and Benjamin Camp will host an introductory workshop to the tools and techniques used in the ensemble-created theater production ¡BIENVENIDOS BLANCOS! OR WELCOME WHITE PEOPLE!