Two-hander plays starring Latinas are having a moment in this year’s Destinos, the fifth annual Chicago International Latino Theater Festival. Among the festival’s 13 productions are Teatro Vista’s “Enough to Let the Light In,” a psychological thriller about two women in love, and American Blues Theater’s “Alma,” a tender mother-daughter drama. In Visión Latino Theatre Company’s “Sancocho,” the latest Destinos show to focus on female relationships, two sisters cook a family recipe together as their conversation meanders through shared memories, past traumas and long-held secrets.
Written by Christin Eve Cato and directed by Xavier M. Custodio, the play is set in the cozy kitchen of Caridad (Antonia Arcely), a middle-aged Puerto Rican American woman who deftly chops vegetables for sancocho — a traditional Latino stew — while wielding an ever-present wine glass in one hand. Her sister, Renata (Amber Lee Ramos), 25 years younger and pregnant with her first child, comes to visit and discuss their terminally ill father’s will. As they chat, the smell of the stew’s ingredients wafts into the first few rows of the audience, creating a pleasant multi-sensory experience.
The two sisters used to be close but now have a more distanced relationship, and the family history that unravels throughout the play explains why. Caridad was forced to grow up young, learning to cook for her father while her mother worked long hours, and went on to raise her own children mostly on her own. Renata, on the other hand, felt the weight of her parents’ expectations as they pressured the bright girl to be the first of the family to attend college; she exceeded their hopes and put herself through law school too.
Arcely and Ramos are quite convincing as sisters with a large age gap between them — an odd dynamic in which the eldest often plays a role somewhere between parent and sibling, while the two siblings may experience very different sides of their actual parents. Caridad’s irreverent humor and practical approach to life contrasts with Renata’s analytical bent and overachieving tendencies, but it’s clear that they love each other despite their differences. Their mother never taught her youngest to cook, but Renata hopes to pass along Puerto Rican culture to her child, so Caridad teaches her sister how to make sancocho. She also gives Renata relationship advice as she angsts over whether her husband is truly “the one.”
Eventually the conversation veers into darker territory, including discussions of past verbal, physical and sexual abuse within the family, and Renata expresses concern that her baby will inherit her generational trauma. Despite being the golden child, she admits that she resented her father for the way he treated her mother but felt helpless to push back. “I never agreed with their way of being,” she says of her parents, “but I regretfully accepted it.”
Caridad shares the pain she suffered from the colorism their father directed toward her; he favored the lighter-skinned Renata and the blond, blue-eyed son that died before either of the girls was born. As if that were not enough family skeletons for one evening, Caridad shocks Renata with the news that they also have a living half-brother, their father’s child from an extramarital affair. This complicates the plans for their father’s will, as a third sibling represents another possible beneficiary of the estate.
Although some elements of their story are culturally specific, anyone with a messy family life will find points of connection with Caridad and Renata, whether in their sibling rivalry or the traumatic memories that haunt them. The inspirational crux of the play lies in what the sisters do with all this baggage — they have the hard conversations, face down their generational trauma and find a path forward toward healing. The stew that they prepare throughout the evening serves as a metaphor for this process, as ingredients are sliced and crushed to create a meal that Renata describes as “healing to the soul.”
“Sancocho” is one of the final productions to open during the 2022 Destinos Festival, and it’s fitting that the show is about two strong Puerto Rican American women. This year’s festival is dedicated to the late Myrna Salazar, cofounder and executive director of the Chicago Latino Theater Alliance, the organization that co-produces Destinos along with the National Museum of Mexican Art, the International Latino Cultural Center and the Puerto Rican Arts Alliance. Born in Puerto Rico and raised in Chicago, Salazar championed Latino theater artists and companies from Chicago, the U.S. and Latin America. Those who carry on her work are surely doing her proud.
Emily McClanathan is a freelance critic.
Review: “Sancocho” (3 stars)
When: Through Oct. 30
Where: Windy City Playhouse, 3014 W. Irving Park Road
Running time: 1 hour, 40 minutes
Tickets: $30-$60 at visionlatino.com