Prisons fascinate playwright Luis Alfaro. His family is from Delano, California, and they all were farmworkers, picking peaches and grapes. Until the Kern Valley State Prison was built, and now they all work there.
In Alfaro’s latest play, Oedipus El Rey, which starts previews at the Magic Theatre on January 28, he reimagines Sophocles’ classic. And like Sophocles, he examines the question of destiny, but in this case, within the prison system. Alfaro says California has the highest rate of recidivism in the United States.
“Sixty percent of all adult males in California prison go back within hours,” he said. “It’s heartbreaking.”
Alfaro got caught up with the idea of writing a story about prison and fate. He wondered why so many of the men in prison went back, and through Father Greg Boyle, who runs Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles, he and the Magic’s artistic director, Loretta Greco, went down to talk with some men who had spent many years in prison.
“The Greeks had kings and kingdoms and for a lot of these guys, this is their kingdom,” Alfaro said. “A lot of these guys don’t know how to live outside the system. It’s where they find honor and respect.”
A winner of the MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, commonly known as a “genius grant,” Alfaro says he loves reading the classics to learn to be a better writer.
“In 90 minutes everything happens-- life and death, everything,” he said. “Structurally they’re extraordinary.”
Alfaro has worked with at-risk youth, and their stories about jealousy, rage, and betrayal are all told in Greek tragedies, he says. A few years ago, when he was reading Electra, he met a young teenager at a juvenile camp who confided to him she had murdered her mother—the same story told in Electra.
“I started thinking ‘Wow, 2400 years ago this happened and we still haven’t learned our lesson,’” Alfaro said. “It’s the same cycle of poverty and the same cycle of abuse.
In Oedipus El Rey, the characters take a trip down Highway 99, going from San Francisco to Los Angeles. As in the Greek plays, there is a chorus, this time made up of prison inmates. Oedipus questions the gods and decides he will be a god himself.
Alfaro, who describes his plays as serious comedies, says he wants to ask questions, not answer them for the audience.
“I hope it provokes people to think about spirituality or destiny and are we all just puppets or can we define our future,” he said. “I hope it inspires people to think about the quality of their lives.”
Oedipus El Rey runs at the Magic Theatre from January 28 through February 28. Tickets can be purchased online or by calling 415-441-8822.
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