Growing up as a Mexican daughter, there were always three things my mother repeated…

1.) Don’t get pregnant

2.) Love is painful, choose wisely (NEVER listened)

3.) si quieres tu celeste, que te cueste.

This translates to if you want your blue sky, you have to work for it. You have to paint it.

In Torera by Monet Hurst-Mendoza, the audience, society finds themselves as the bull that Elena María Ramírez is fighting, or more elegantly dancing with. Elena aspires to become a ‘torera,’ a female bullfighter. Her journey represents a quest for autonomy and self-definition in a world where traditional expectations often limit women's ambitions.  These challenges of cultural expectations plague our protagonist as she attempts to take flight alongside her best friend and fellow emerging bullfighter Tanok Cárdenas. Perhaps what excited me the most was that Elena’s dream is not far from my own or that of many. No, not the bullfighting part (I take emotional risks, not physical ones), but rather being everything your family, or the world, has told you can’t be. Creating fertile soil for a very daring, defying, hysterical story that embodies the pursuit of dreams against societal norms, particularly in the context of gender roles and cultural heritage.

As a Mexican immigrant but raised in New York, this production felt like a plane ride home.

I had the honor to chat with the playwright herself, Monet Hurst-Mendoza, about her playwriting journey, rehearsal discoveries, the importance of collaboration, a table, and how a play that centers Mexicanidad is an act of resistance and a call for unity. After all, we all have had our own purpose questioned.

[Two playwrights giggle over frozen palomas! In a very Tex-Mex restaurant, the IRONY]

Amalia: Torera was one of the first plays I read on New Play Exchange, that I was like, holy moly, there's a Mexicana writing about us. I remember being blown away and then meeting you when you supported my own work. I'm just so excited and thrilled to be here, celebrating you, because it's a long time coming, right? Can you tell me a little bit about how long Torera has been in the works?

Monet: Torera has been in the works for about 10 years, but I've been writing plays for about 20. So this is my off-Broadway debut. I've had other things happen in New York but nothing at this scale, so it's very exciting. It feels incredibly gratifying to finally have it up and running, and to be validated and affirmed in this way. Yes, yes. I want to go back to the inception of Torera.

Amalia: Where was she born?

Monet: The inception of Torera came about when I was doing the Emerging Writers Group at the Public Theater. I had applied many times before, but I had never advanced. And then the year that I got in, I was a finalist. And part of the interview process was to pitch, you know, like an idea for a play that you want to work on while you're in the group for two years. And I didn't know what I was going to pitch. And I remembered that, you know, a few weeks prior, I had heard something on NPR about Lupita Lopez, who was at the time one of only seven female matadoras who had reached that title. And she's from Yucatan, from Merida, where my family's from, which is where the play takes place. And she was a female bullfighter. So it was twofold. I am grateful for that, because this is one of my strongest plays, and it's the one I'm the most proud of.

Amalia: Are there any significant changes or shifts you’ve discovered over the years?

Monet: Tatiana Pandiani (the director) and I have been working on this play for a little less than a decade.She's been my main collaborator on this, and Jaqui Guillíen, who portrays Elena. The three of us have a very close collaborative relationship, and the biggest discovery of putting it on its feet in different spaces has been seeing how doing it in the round affects it versus doing it on a proscenium, as well as the inclusion of various designers. I'm the kind of person that's like, if somebody has a smarter idea than me, a better idea, then let's go with it. I don't think that I am the smartest person in the room by any stretch of the imagination. I know the characters and I know my story, but I feel like the way you grow as a writer is by staying open.

While the world of the play craves to be in the round, the set by Emmie Finckel manages to channel that circular longing through its spatial intimacy and elemental design. The environment feels both open and enclosed—its textures recalling the colors, smells of oranges and flora of the Yucatán peninsula. Subtle shifts in light and structure through movement-based transitions mirror the play’s negotiation between the real and magical realism, ancient and modern. Costume design by Rodrigo Muñoz enriches this world further, weaving color palettes and textiles that evoke both indigenous Maya aesthetics and colonial impositions. All of this blended with the magic the actors make as they embody characters across different ages and emotions. The result is a living tapestry: garments that carry the memory of the land, the weight of history, both of a country and of the Cárdenas/Ramírez family, and the resilience of a culture continually reimagining itself.

As I watched, I kept thinking about how rare and important it is, especially now, when xenophobia feels so present, to witness a work that insists on tenderness and humor. Torera’s world unfolded like an act of care. The choreography, at times almost superfluous but unique, became a kind of emotional cipher, translating what the text could only gesture toward. A visual language all its own: a guide to the characters, the world of the play, unspoken griefs and quiet hopes. One could sense it had been crafted in a rehearsal room brimming with love, in a space where every artist treated another’s work with deep respect. The result was nothing short of luminous.

Monet:  A lot of times we were like this is an impossible play. How are we going to do it? What I love about Tatiana is that she never says no. She said, Let's figure this out. When I started sharing Torera many producers told us ‘Oh, this is unproducible,’ I think because their vision was too narrow. This play needs people who are game to play and who can think outside the box. That's very much Tatiana and our entire team.. There's nothing in the script that specifies that it needs to be dancers. I always want things to be open. So it can be dancers. It can be puppets. It can be lights. It can be anything. I want people to really get creative and not feel limited because that's also the point of the story. Don't be limited. Think bigger. Do the thing that is scary and tough.

What I love most about this piece is how decisively it decentralizes the men in the play. Yes, Tanok performs an act of care and solidarity, a gesture toward his friend, but the story ultimately refuses to orbit around him, even after all the tragedy. Instead, it turns its gaze toward Elena, watching as she becomes the matadora she was always meant to be.

In much of traditional Mexican culture, men are at the center, and women are raised to remain in the kitchen, to serve, and to find virtue in self-containment. Dreaming beyond those walls is often seen as betrayal—of tradition, of family, of the women who came before us. This play argues the opposite. It insists that we were born within those walls precisely so we could learn to break through them. It’s about severing the thread of generational limitation, about what it means to take flight. When Elena declares, “I am a bird,” it doesn’t just belong to her—it belongs to all of us. My mother, her mother, my cousins, yours, you, and me. It’s a moment of collective transcendence, exemplified when Elena, who is playing pretend bullfighting, states, “women matadora, women presidenta.”

While the play spans across many years, it does not include this one. But this line would say otherwise. It is now 2025, and Mexico has its first actual presidenta, Claudia Sheinbaum. This play, this year, echoes the female self-determination that has been suppressed for a long time. Elena’s flight isn’t a metaphor; it’s a prophecy, a nation beginning to imagine itself through women who dare to lead, to be the first, a reminder that liberation, especially for women, is both inherited and self-made.

Monet: It's so funny. I wrote this play  almost 10 years ago.

Amalia: And it’s so relevant!

(Side note: personally, I think playwrights are prophets, as I mentioned, and Monet helped manifest Mexico’s future! Even though she says the opposite below.)

Monet: Sometimes these themes of class and race and gender or societal expectations are evergreen. It is a joy to see where things have changed, and a sore spot to see where they haven't. It's interesting because you're a Mexican citizen who is now a U.S citizen. For me, it's the opposite; I'm a US citizen whose family is from Mexico, so it has been engaging writing about the perspective of Mexicans in Mexico being an American. Still, it has allowed me in, but this again goes back to universality. The more specific you are, the more universal it is.

Amalia: The patriarchy doesn't care about the north or the south of the border. I would like to continue discussing the classicism you highlighted, which is the most significant theme here. This makes sense because it is and continues to be one of Mexico’s prominent issues. Could you tell me a little bit about why that was so important for you to center?

Monet: There is this notion as Americans that Mexico is this place that's completely impoverished, or that it's a third world country, and what people don't realize is that it's just like any other country. There are wealthy people and there are poor people and the disparity in Mexico is quite large. You can really see who's living lavishly and who's living poor. The middle class is not as present as it was in the U.S. though right now the middle class in the U.S. is disappearing anyway.

Amalia:  Yeah and I would argue as someone who travels to Mexico often,the middle class in Mexico is growing a little more. Not to the extent of challenging the U.S but it's become less common to be very very poor.

Monet: Yeah, and this play spans 20 years, starting in 1992, so we have to remember what things were like in 1992, right? Mexico is a completely different culture financially. That's a very subtle thing that I am trying to nod to without beating it over the head. The way that I set up the class is also tied to occupation. This is a family, a generational family of one family taking care of another family. How do those lines intersect based on the relationships?

I was a nanny for many years, and it’s like you're part of a family but you're not part of the family at the same time, but you're privy to all these very personal details. I haven't been like somebody's housekeeper but I've been somebody's nanny taking care of their children, bathing them, putting them to bed, being with them when they're sick, picking them up from school, being their emergency contact.

Amalia: Totally, there's so many exchanges between your characters that do a beautiful job at blurring that line and THEN BOOM here comes a reminder that these characters are not on the same playing field!

Monet: These lines are blurry when you're working in somebody else's home.

Amalia:  Whenever Don Rafael has these really demeaning moments with Elena, you're kind of like what the heck? But I do think it's born out of protecting and continuing the lie (no spoilers!), right?

Monet: Yes. And I think, like, you know, I worked very hard on creating this, like, these pairs, right? Like, Tanok and Elena are, like, a future version of Rafael and Pastora. And maybe if Rafael and Pastora were able to sort of transcend their positions, they could have a more beautiful relationship, close relationship, the way that Elena and Tanok were.

Amalia: What's the lore? The lore behind Pastora and Don Rafael.

Monet: What, that they fucked on that table?

Amalia: I knew they did!! Are you kidding me? Thank you, it's so obvious she kept touching it! I was like damn, you really love this table!!

Monet: It's amazing how many people pick up on that and how many people don't. More people don't pick up on it, but to me it's obvious!

Amalia: You know what it was? It was her singing of Juan Gabriel's Hasta Te Conoci! BFR, girl!!!

Monet: I’m so deliberate with my music choices!

Amalia: I know that's right!!! That's the beauty of dramaturgy.

I left the theater with my mind still circling those two characters, and that, to me, is the mark of powerful storytelling when the two characters with the least amount of lines are the ones haunting me. What truly happened between Pastora and Don Rafael? Was it love, disillusionment, or something far more elusive? The playwright offers only glimmers, subtle hints tucked within her musical choices. When “Hasta Te Conocí” by Juan Gabriel plays, a song iconic for its aching blend of love and release, it feels less like background music and more like a revelation. Through that melody, we sense what words never confirm: that love, in this world, is inseparable from the act of letting go. I ached for lore, and I got it, but I am redacting it here because you should see Torera at the WP and find out for yourself :p

Furthermore, gender expectations in Mexican culture constrict everyone. While women are taught to serve and sustain, men are taught to contain and provide—to be the keepers of tradition and silence, but what happens when that can no longer be the case? What happens when two characters reject everything they’ve been taught? You take up the form of bullfighting Primer Tercio.

Monet: Tanok represents someone who can permeate the class, transcending class distinctions. He is a wealthy boy who enjoys luxurious things. But these strong women raised him, and he loves them.

Amalia: He's a lover boy.

Monet: Jared [Machado] is just the sweetest interpretation of that. He can be in both worlds, and Rafael does not possess that. Every generation, we hope to become wiser and closer to achieving equality. I think I was trying to play with that a little bit.

Amalia:  Mexican men. Let me tell you.

Monet: Don't I know it.

Amalia: This play is your way of resisting all of that.

Monet: Thank you. That means a lot. In this very divisive time, we need to remember our humanity. And it doesn't matter what country we're from, what our station in life is, how much money we make, what our gender is. It is essential that we remember that we're all humans. And we all deserve dignity. We all deserve respect.

And we cannot keep pushing other people down, whether we're pushing each other down because of our different genders or because one person makes more money than another.

Amalia: I'm going to add to that. Your play helps us remember that, despite all those things, as you mentioned —class, gender, status, whatever —we all deserve the right to be palomitas.

Fly  and “ be invincible... soar above everything.”  

To do the impossible.

Your play reminds us that it is possible.

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Torera is running at WP Theater through October 26.

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