Alyssa Carrasco starred in two of the most compelling local productions of the past couple of years, Is Edward Snowden Single? at Second Thought Theatre and Cloud Tectonics at Teatro Dallas. Now she鈥檚 making her professional directing debut.
A 2021 graduate of the theater program at the University of Oklahoma, she was approached by Teatro Dallas producer Mac Welch after he saw her work in Snowden, Carrasco says. She knew of the company but had never seen one of their productions or auditioned for a show.
Long a home for emerging artists, the 40-year-old troupe has rededicated itself to that mission, including the festival , which pairs experienced directors with newcomers. The opportunity for Carrasco is also part of the plan. She was the assistant director of this season鈥檚 opening show, , and was asked to choose a play to direct herself as the closer.
鈥淚 totally expected them to give me a play they wanted to do, but they gave me full creative liberty,鈥� says in a phone interview. 鈥淢ac told me, 鈥楧o anything that speaks to you.鈥� I love Latino theater so I knew I wanted to do a play about my culture. Octavio Solis does a lot of plays set in El Paso, which is where my mom is from. When I was growing up, we were always there. So I read a bunch of his work, and the one that spoke to me was El Otro.鈥�
Solis received his master鈥檚 degree from a Trinity University program at Dallas Theater Center and got his first big break from Teatro Dallas. In 1987, . It premiered the following year. He has gone on to a fruitful career, with productions of his two dozen plays from San Francisco to Chicago to New York.
In Dallas alone, his work has been seen at the Theater Center, Undermain Theatre, Kitchen Dog Theater and Cara Mia Theatre.
is a surreal, harrowing tale about a 13-year-old girl who鈥檚 forced to choose between her two fathers. She鈥檚 being picked up from her housepainter-turned-drug-dealer birth father by her mother鈥檚 straitlaced new husband. But the journey goes awry with an unscheduled stop to retrieve a present.
鈥淚 would describe it as a dark coming-of-age story,鈥� Carrasco says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 about a girl trying to find her identity and her past, how she came to be. It鈥檚 scarily similar to my life because I come from a split family and the most stable thing is my mother. I really related to the character being stuck in the middle. Her mother is too. They鈥檙e also stuck between a land of reality and the land that we call el otro.鈥�
Born in Irving and raised in Arlington, Carrasco came to theater during her freshman year of high school. She had planned to study journalism but something didn鈥檛 feel right.
鈥淚 had this gut feeling that I needed to change my schedule and enroll in theater,鈥� she says. 鈥淚鈥檇 never done it before. But once I started doing things in class, the teacher told me, 鈥榊ou鈥檙e good at this.鈥� I said, 鈥極h, my God, thank you. I鈥檝e never been good at anything.鈥� 鈥�
At OU, her stepfather鈥檚 alma mater, she majored in acting and took classes in directing and dramaturgy. Rivera is also the author of Cloud Tectonics.
, Carrasco appeared opposite another great local Latino actor, Omar Padilla. Their characters fall in love during a monumental rainstorm in Los Angeles. Her next acting gig is in Shakespeare Dallas鈥� production of The Taming of the Shrew this fall.
鈥淎cting is extremely cathartic for me, to express all these feelings that a person goes through, whether it鈥檚 pain, guilt, loss, to the happiest of feelings.鈥� she says. 鈥淚鈥檓 very bubbly and like to be happy in front of people, so the stage is where I get to release all of them. It feels like flying. Directing, I have to put on a different persona because I鈥檓 five-foot. I鈥檓 super peppy. I鈥檓 a girl. It all falls on you if something goes right, if something goes wrong. I kind of like that challenge.鈥�
Carrasco thought about moving to New York or L.A. after graduating from college but decided it made more financial sense to return to North Texas, at least for the time being. For a while, she was living with her mother and stepfather in Arlington. Now she鈥檚 on her own in Dallas.
鈥淚鈥檝e learned that whatever plan I鈥檓 going to make, it鈥檚 going to get sidetracked,鈥� she says. 鈥淩ight now, I鈥檓 comfortable in Dallas. But I don鈥檛 think that I can go my full life without trying a big city eventually.鈥�
Details
El Otro runs May 16-31 at the Latino Cultural Center, 2600 Live Oak St. $25. .
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