Melíza Gutierrez

All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration. For we are the ones we have been waiting for.

– From the Elders of the Hopi Nation

It is the greatest privilege of my life to be a theater artist. I’m so grateful to have a body, voice, mind, and spirit vast enough to live countless lives and tell infinite stories. There are many things that I don’t understand about this world, but doing this work and being in community with other artists keeps me curious and hopeful about the future, and they never fail to remind me of the wild excitement of being alive.

I’ve been shaped as an artist by neofuturism and Latin theater. In my undergrad at UC Irvine, I helped establish the neofuturist collective, Schrödinger’s Cast: 30 Plays in 60 Minutes and served as Co-Artistic Director of the student-led Latin theater group, Brown Bag Theater Company. I went on to work as an actor, poet, and playwright at East LA’s Casa 101 Theater, Breath of Fire Latina Theater Ensemble, and The Workshop Theater in NYC. In my career so far, I’ve loved the dichotomy of working in the lands of devising and new works as well as in the classics with my Shakespeare training culminating in three consecutive summers doing exciting interpretations of Shakespeare’s work at the Notre Dame Shakespeare Festival.