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The tone for “The Tears of Lives” was set before the play started.
Little 9-year-old Katherine went onstage and explained how deputies from the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Department had arrested her worker parents for not having immigration papers.
“Thank you for coming to this play,” she told the audience in perfect English.
Her appearance was a jolting reminder that what was about to unfold as theater was derived from the cruel reality of the many children across the country who have been “orphaned” when federal or local police arrest and deport their parents.
“The Tears of Lives” is the latest production by prolific playwright James E. Garcia, founder of New Carpa Theater Co., a company dedicated to fostering and developing Latino and multicultural theater.
Under Garcia’s guidance, New Carpa, albeit low-budget and using minimal sets and props, brings to the Phoenix community original theater that shakes up the misperceptions and stereotypes non Latinos have of Latinos.
The show finished its two-weekends run Sunday, Aug. 22, but the playwright hopes that the message carries on by making theatergoers think about the immigrant families torn apart by this country’s wide scale crackdown on undocumented immigrants.
“There have been cases across the country where local police and ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) agents have gone in to work sites and arrested 60 people at a time without warning,” Garcia said. “The children are left on their own to figure how to make it without parents.”
“Tears” is the story of Regino Ortega (Masavi Perea), an undocumented immigrant who has been living in the United States for 21 years who is arrested by ICE agents and Maricopa County Sheriff’s deputies. (Sound familiar?) His three young children: Olivia, 17 (Rosa Millan); Vanessa, 16 (Perla Farias); and Carlos, 8 (Mateo Perea); are left behind and forced to fend for themselves.
The playwright added that “Tears” is inspired by a true story.
“This particular story inspired by a man taken by deputies during one of their raids. His children survived for month, figuring out how to pay rent and the bills. Each morning the got up, got dressed and went to school,” Garcia said.
The majority of Garcia’s playwriting and productions are stimulated by the daily headlines, politics, and events happening in the Phoenix metropolitan community in which he lives.
“As a playwright, my job is to provide audiences with engaging drama and entertainment,” he said. “However, I also believe I have a responsibility to comment on the issues of our times. The issue addressed in this play is the role that our immigration policy plays on the separation of families. This issue is at once intimately human and publicly impactful.”
Garcia added that he wrote “The Tears of Lives” to address the increasing hate and bigotry toward undocumented Latinos here in the Valley.
“These individuals are being singled out because they are powerless and because they are people of color,” he said. “There has been a gradual and steady increase in the demonization of these people. The more and more the police push their authority, the more they are allowed to legally hunt immigrants. The worst case scenario is what occurred in Nazi Germany, but we haven’t arrived at that point here yet.”
As a playwright, Garcia faces the dilemma of all dramatists that deal with political or emotional topics – the danger of propagandizing or over sentimentalizing the plot and characters. This problem is intensified because the play run was also a fund-raiser for the Centro Macehualli, a Phoenix center for immigrant workers that had most of its funding pulled by local nonprofits.
To be sure, Garcia’s characters are one-dimensional: The immigrant family is headed by hard-working, undocumented father, and his citizen kids studiously complete their homework to make good grades. The American Dream seems within their grasp until the bullying sheriff’s deputy Capt. Montoya (Andrew Valenzuela) helps to deport the father and searches for the children he knows are hiding somewhere.
And Anita (Olivia Carvajal), the daughters’ high school principal is a good-hearted liberal while the slogan-shouting Caputo (Cynthia Elek), the founder of Mothers Against Immigrants, rabidly opposes any public services for immigrants.
Nor do any of the character undergo change during the 80 minutes of this one-act play, character growth being a basic drama principle.
“Tears” was more political theater than dramatic theater, but the experience and talents of director Luis Avila and the 13-member cast transformed this production from pure propaganda to a tragedy that brought to the stage the fearful reality that so many immigrants and their families face each day.
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