KENMORE, N.Y. (WKBW) — A new play is coming to Shea's 710, but it looks a bit different than your average musical.
The Magical Closet Mystery will be playing March 27 through the 28 as part of the theater's "On School Time" series.
Author María Pérez Gómez stepped back in to write the screenplay for Raíces Theater Company and she is so excited for the path her vision has taken.
“The pages are jumping out and now they’re on stage.”
Gómez received several awards for her work on the book series and has become an inspiration for the local community.
For the time being, the cast has been practicing at Kenmore Commons.
Two of the cast members are María's sons Rolando and Alejandro Gómez.
Rolando says the play is unique because of the way it's written through the eyes of children.
“You’re seeing it through their eyes, right? Through an eight-year-old, nine-year-old, twelve-year-old.”
He says that usually, childrens' perspectives take a backseat when it comes to telling stories, which is what makes this play stand out.
He said it's also interesting to take off his "adult cap" to truly encompass his character.
“I think it’s the most hard but fun thing that we can definitely do.”
His brother Alejandro agrees that as an adult, it takes more effort to dive into the mind of a child again.
“When you’re trying to act like a 10-year-old, you have to see the world in a way of wonder, curiosity and awe,” he said.
“As the years have gone by, you notice that those qualities need to become more and more intentional. They’re not inherent in you. The world kind of does its best to strip those qualities away.”
Cristalis Bonilla plays "Magía", the titular character.
She says that the message of the play is really what stood out to her.
"It tackles a lot of issues that we face at home and we might not really know how to go about it. And seeing other interpretations of that brings awareness to ourselves and to just the future generations.”
Another aspect that the play aims to highlight is diversity.
Each member of the production team as well as the cast is all part of the Hispanic and Latino community.
The play will be featuring Puerto Rican Cuatro player Fabiola Méndez as a cast member in the play.
Puerto Rican singer-songwriter Manolo Ramos helped with the arrangement and production of songs in the musical.
María's sister Victoria Pérez directs the play and told me that it's important to tell stories that truly capture the experience of Hispanic and Latino individuals.
"Not a lot of them have people that look like me and you, and not a lot of them deal with our own cultural experiences- our specific cultural experiences," she said.
"So when you grow up never seeing yourself reflected in the media, I believe, even from my own experience, that there’s like an emptiness.”
Working with both Shea's and Raíces, Victoria hopes that she can integrate more diversity into the sphere of theater.
"That's what we do at Raíces. We adapt things, we create new work and we are deeply committed to the development of Latino artists.”
By running this play, the team hopes that this will allow individuals to be able to relate to the things they are seeing onstage with the things they experience in their own lives offstage.
María Pérez Gómez said that she hopes to give children a safe space that will allow them to process their grief and trauma just like she had to after the death of her brother when she was just seven years old.
"I wanted to write a book based on my experience with grief and offer children the space to process it safely in a way that includes adventure, cultura, music, food," she said.
"So, it’s educational but it also has that emotional intelligence component which assists children to navigate and to journey through those emotions in a safe way.”
The group hopes to continue to amplify the voices of the Hispanic and Latino community the way they have been through music and theater.
Una versión de esta historia esta disponible aquí.
A Spanish version of this story is available above.
