Roja
By Jaime Lozano & Tommy Newman
Directed by Florencia Cuenca
Music Direction by Sean Kana
Sunday, August 9 @ 3pm
Thursday, August 13 @ 7:30pm
Sunday, August 16 @ 3pm
Fusing traditional, Mexican folk music and Mestizo folklore, Roja is a new twist on the Little Red Riding Hood story. Roja and her mother live on a struggling farm at the edge of the desert in Northern Mexico. When Roja rescues a mischievous, magical coyote, he offers her the chance to see her father again. What follows is an enchanting journey of love, loss, and resilience, set against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution.
Roja was created and developed in residency at the Forestburgh Playhouse in May of 2024. It was presented in a table reading with The New Group in Manhattan that same summer. In September of 2024, it was further developed and presented with assistance from the Forestburgh Playhouse “In the Works-In the Woods” Festival in Forestburgh, NY. Roja has since been developed in part at Rhinebeck Writer’s Retreat in 2025. It was presented by the National Alliance of Musical Theatre in their annual festival of new musicals in 2025 and received a generous grant for development with funding from the Pipeline Arts Foundation in May of 2025. Scheduled development in 2026 with At Rise! Boston’s New Musicals Partnership (SpeakEasy Stage & Somerled Arts).
CREATIVE TEAM
JAIME LOZANO, Playwright
Jaime Lozano is a Mexican multi-hyphenate musical theatre storyteller and activist hailed by Lin-Manuel Miranda as the “next big thing” on Broadway. A 2022 Jonathan Larson Grant recipient. His works include El Otro Oz (TWUSA, Atlantic Theater Company), A Never-Ending Line (Off-Broadway), Desaparecidas (JACK), Roja (NAMT). His project “Jaime Lozano & The Familia” has performed at Joe’s Pub, 54 Below, Lincoln Center, Sony Hall, Two River Theater. Currently working on Frida, The Musical, Él y Ella. With his wife, Florencia Cuenca, he founded The Familia, an organization created to foster community and artistic opportunities for Latine and Immigrant artists. MFA: NYU/Tisch, Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program. Proud member of the Dramatists Guild of America, AFM Local 802, BMI. www.jaimelozano.net @jaimelozano
TOMMY NEWMAN, Playwright
Tommy Newman is an award-winning playwright, composer and lyricist. 2013 ASCAP Foundation Cole Porter Award, recipient of an Anna Sosenko Assist Trust Grant, 2025 Pipeline Arts Foundation Grant, 2014 Kennedy Center ACTF National Musical Theatre Award. Selected works include: Tinyard Hill (TheatreWorks Silicon Valley), Band Geeks! (Goodspeed), The Single Girl’s Guide (Capital Repertory). Off Broadway: We the People: America Rocks (Theatreworks USA), 29 (NYU), El Otro Oz (Theatreworks USA and The Alliance), The Teacher from the Black Lagoon (Theatreworks USA). Recent selected works include: With Bells On, Our Lady of 7-Eleven, Songs of Light and Joy: A Diwali Celebration, and Private Lives: the Musical, created with Dev Janki. Recent works also include Jenny’s Damned Ex, Savage, and Roja, created with Jaime Lozano. www.tommynewman.com, instagram @tommynewmanmusic
CAST
RINABETH APOSTOL
RINABETH APOSTOL thoroughly enjoys her time with TheatreWorks - in The Four Immigrants: An American Musical Manga, Red and numerous New Works Festivals. She has also appeared in many new works onstage at American Conservatory Theater, Actors Theater of Louisville, Seattle Rep, TheatreWorks, CalShakes, The Magic, Arizona Theater Company, East West Players, Skirball Center for the Arts, and Berkeley Rep Ground Floor, among others. 2022-2023 productions: Redwinged Blackbird (world premiere), Fun Home (42nd Street Moon), Monument (world premiere, Magic Theater), Smart People and The Chinese Lady (Capital Stage), South Pacific (Billings Symphony) and Hamlet (Marin Shakes). Offstage, you can hear her on Sirius XM/Marvel’s UNBEATABLE SQUIRREL GIRL Podcast as Gretchen Campbell. Upcoming: Bald Sisters and My Home On The Moon. Proud member AEA, SAG-AFTRA. @rbdtwo | rinabeth.com
LAWRENCE-MICHAEL C. ARIAS
LAWRENCE-MICHAEL C. ARIAS is honored to join this year’s New Works Festival. He was recently seen as “Mushnik” in Theatreworks’ Little Shop of Horrors. He also performed in M. Butterfly (Kurogo), Red (Red Guard), Batboy: The Musical (Roy/Mrs. Taylor, etc. at select performances for James Monroe Iglehart), Jane Eyre The Musical (Robert u/s), and Pacific Overtures [2001](British Admiral/Merchant). He originated the role of ‘Wong’ in Utah Shakespeare Festival’s world premiere of Gold Mountain. Other regional credits: National Asian Artists Project/Prospect Theatre’s staged concert of Gold Mountain (Wong). Other Bay Area credits: Hillbarn Theatre - The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Mitch Mahoney); Los Altos Stage Company - Yellow Face (HYH); Pintello Comedy Theatre - A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (Miles Gloriosus); Western Stage - Man of La Mancha (Sancho). Film: Protection Detail (Sonny).
LUCINDA HITCHCOCK CONE
LUCINDA HITCHCOCK CONE: TheatreWorks appearances include Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Tuck Everlasting, Outside Mullingar, Big River, The Clean House, Ragtime, and Cabaret. She appeared in the National Tour of Big River. Recently she appeared in Grand Horizons at San Jose Stage Co. where she also played Linda Loman in Death of a Salesman. Regional credits include productions at Hartford Stage, Arizona Theatre Company, Indiana Repertory Theatre, Syracuse Stage, Geva Theatre, Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, Folger Theatre, ACT, Berkeley Rep., San Jose Rep., Sacramento Music Circus, Capital Stage, B Street Theatre, Aurora Theatre, AMTSJ, Marin Theatre Company, PCPA, and the Coconut Grove Playhouse. Lucinda received four SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle awards, and a Dramalogue award. Lucinda studied Mime with Etienne Decroux.
JACQUELINE DE MURO
JACQUELINE DE MURO has performed with TheatreWorks in A Little Night Music (Mrs Segstrom), Pacific Overtures (Shogun’s Mother), Joy Luck Club (Amah), Kiss of the Spiderwoman (Marta), and Into The Woods (Cinderella’s Mother). Most recently, she appeared in New Conservatory Theatre Center’s Encore. Other favorite local productions include Broadway by the Bay’s The King And I (Lady Thiang) and Thoroughly Modern Millie (Muzzy), Woodminster’s Flower Drum Song (Madame Liang), Palo Alto Players’ City Of Angels (Alaura/Carla) and The Baker’s Wife (Genevieve), Busbarn’s And The World Goes Round and Baby (Pam), 42nd Street Moon’s Grand Night For Singing and By Jupiter (Buria), Ohlone Stage’s Man Of La Mancha (Aldonza), and Foothill Theatre’s South Pacific (Bloody Mary), for which she won a Bay Area Theatre Critics Award.
MICHAEL PATRICK GAFFNEY
MICHAEL PATRICK GAFFNEY has been working as an actor in the Bay Area for the past 25 years and is very honored to be performing this summer with TheatreWorks! Last spring he played the role of the Interlocutor in The Scottsboro Boys with 42nd Street Moon. Other regional theatre companies Michael has worked with include: Center Rep, Shotgun Players, Aurora Theatre Company, San Jose Stage Company, Word for Word, and Contra Costa Musical Theatre. Michael has been a proud member of Actors’ Equity Association since 1997.
EMILY KURODA
EMILY KURODA worked at TheatreWorks (The Language Archive, Calligraphy), South Coast Rep (Tiger Style!, Fast Company, Our Town, Ballad of Yachiyo), New York Theatre Workshop (Endlings), Yale Rep (Today is My Birthday), Pan Asian (Brothers Paranormal), American Repertory Theater (Endlings), Page 73 (Today is My Birthday), Actors Theater of Louisville (we, the invisibles), Huntington Theater (Tiger Style!, Woman Warrior), Artists at Play (Two Mile Hollow), Alliance Theater (Tiger Style!), Sundance Theater Lab (Today is My Birthday, A Cage of Fireflies), East West Players (over 45 productions), Kirk Douglas, Mark Taper Forum, Public Theater, La Jolla Playhouse, Seattle Rep, Singapore Repertory, Berkeley Repertory, The Doolittle, LATC, Zephyr, LA Women’s Shakespeare Company, and the Los Angeles Shakespeare Festival. Selected TV: Mrs. Kim in Gilmore Girls, Baymax, All Rise, The Good Doctor, The Resident, Drop Dead Diva, Sequestered and Amazon’s The Power. Recent Films Strange World, Kimi, Porcupine, Take the 10, Party Boat, Red, Yellow Face and Sensei.
Program
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