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The Latina Christmas Special

Reviewed by Jessica Salans

Latino Theater Company at The LATC

Through December 20

RECOMMENDED

“Could you pick up the Latina Xmas comedy show at LATC this weekend?”

This arrived the day after reviews had been assigned from Bill Raden, the new chief in charge of Stage Raw’s boots on the ground. SLM, serving as Executive Director for the LASA squad, remains as our omnipresent eye but Bill handles the call of daily grind duties. Apparently, the PR contact for this particular show had been hounding him to have it reviewed.

Once the assignment was accepted, the hounding began for me.

“Why does he insist on having my phone number?” “How many confirmations can I send before he understands I have received the press materials?” I was truly annoyed by the repetitive prodding from the publicist for The Latina Christmas Special at LATC. That is, until after I saw the show and went home to search for past reviews — it had been done twice before in Los Angeles — and came up with only a single review.

Only one review for a show mounted three separate times? Ok, publicist, prod away.

The Latina Christmas Special features three Latina comediennes. It first premiered in December 2013 and was produced by Atomictuna and Combined Artform at the now shuttered Theatre Asylum. The single review it received in 2013 was from Latin Heat, a Hollywood Latino entertainment publication.  The production enjoyed a nine-day sold-out run in a remounted production a year later in the same theater. During that run Geoffrey Rivas, artistic director of the Latino Theatre Company and director of the current staging, saw the show and decided to bring it to LATC to introduce it to a wider audience.

It begins in a modern day living room decked out with Christmas lights and holiday ornaments. The three performers — Maria Russell, Diana Yanez and Sandra Valls — gather around a piano to sing, then romp about for fifteen minutes indulging in sitcom banter. Finally, we get to the heart of the play; brave autobiographical accounts, generously shared, of what Christmas meant for each woman when she was growing up.

Russell describes her younger self as a star-to-be, the attention-seeking princess in her Mexican/Lithuanian family.  She adored her mother, her biggest fan, who allowed her to dance to songs like Sex Shooter at age seven.

Yanez, of Cuban extraction, grew up in Miami. She recalls her mother out-holidaying the neighbors by spraying every inch of their windows with snow-in-a-can and adding more plastic holiday characters to their front lawn. Yanez yearned to have a regular “white” Christmas like the one displayed on the Donny and Marie show. Instead, her family’s Christmas was spent cornering a cockroach the size of Santa’s moustache.

Valls recounts her dismay at receiving “girl presents” every year from her parents and having to fob them off on her younger sister. Hers becomes the most emotional story, and ends with coming to terms with taking care of her sick mother. “It is not what we have to do but instead what we get to do,” she says. The most valuable thing she shares with the audience is encouraging us to live a positive life — to be grateful for the opportunities we have been given to enjoy our lives instead of mourning those difficult times we have to live through.

Each story is interwoven with Spanish language and idioms. The night I attended, many in the audience — a diverse group — understood where the women were coming from. Much of the laughter seemed to come from a place of shared experiences; Russell was their younger sister, a prima donna, Yanez’s mother was exactly like their own, and Valle’s pain was something they too were experiencing or had been through with their own aging parents.

There is universal humor in the dynamics of a family, whatever the culture. As for the social context within which these shows are performed: What does it say about a society where every year publications send a reviewer to cover A Christmas Carol but cannot find the space to share critical thought on an original play penned by three first generation Latinas? Russell, Yanez and Valle have gumption, sass and hearts brimming with dynamic stories.

Latino Theater Company at LATC; 514 S. Spring St, Los Angeles; Thurs.-Sat. 8 p.m., Sun. 3 p.m.; through Dec. 20. (866) 811-4111 or https://latinachristmasspecial.com/tix.html; Running time: approximately 90 minutes, with no intermission.