A Chat With The Creative Team of ‘Waking La Llorona’

The immersive workshop production in San Diego brings out some ‘Sleep No More’ vets.

David Reynoso and Careena Melia are no strangers to immersive theatre.

Reynoso is the OBIE Award Winning Designer of Sleep No More, and Melia created the role of Hecate in the original production of that seminal piece, as came with the show to open it in New York. In other words: they are immersive OGs, if such titles can doled out to anyone.

Now the pair have teamed up to create a piece under the auspices of a grant from the Creative Catalyst Fund of The San Diego Foundation and with guidance and support from The Old Globe.

That piece is Waking La Llorona, billed as a 30-minute immersive exploration of the legend. The workshop has drawn in Sleep No More alums Kelly Bartnik (original Bald Witch) and Robert Najarian (original Malcolm / Man in Bar) as part of the cast, and is one of the more intriguing projects to pop up on our radar in the Southland in some time.

We spoke to Reynoso and Melia via email. The following interview has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.

NO PROSCENIUM: Waking La Llorona is, I assume, based on the legend of La Llorona, could you tell us a bit about that story and why you were drawn to it?

DAVID REYNOSO: I was born and raised in Guadalajara and the story of La Llorona is an infamous tale in Mexico. I grew up hearing many different iterations of this terrifying woman who commits infanticide and is doomed to weep and wail for the loss of her departed children.

Kids were warned to beware of her apparition in the night (or in the rain) for fear she might mistake you for her offspring and snatch you away. She is largely considered to be a boogey-man (boogey-woman?) and her story is fodder for many campfire ghost stories and haunted houses.

It wasn’t until I was an adult that I revisited the story with greater understanding. I began looking into the most traditional narrations of the tale and found many similarities to the Greek tragedy Medea. Somehow, though the play Medea succeeds in bringing out deeper themes of social inequality and it made me wonder if there was more to this folktale that typically, went unmentioned in its retelling.

I was amazed to discover that very early versions of La Llorona really flesh out what leads to her heinous actions and you can see that there is more to the story than meets the eye.

I hope that with Waking La Llorona, we can introduce her story to audiences unacquainted with her and to challenge the viewpoints and expectations of those already familiar with the lore surrounding this fascinating woman.

CAREENA MELIA: David had approached me about this project in 2014 and I was immediately struck by the similarities to the Irish Banshee legend and also it’s closeness to Medea. The material is so rich and there’s so much you could do with it in terms of an immersive structure. I also knew that David could create something incredibly visually compelling from this story.

NP: Immersive theatre has such a wide range, what part of the spectrum are you interested in playing with this time?

DR: I don’t want to give away too much, but I will say that we are experimenting with using every day familiar technologies to immerse and transport ourselves elsewhere… how we accept entering a new dimension instantly and leave behind the mundane.

CM: This production is really a solo venture — as it is one audience member at a time. I think this format really heightens the sense of danger and intensity of experience. Instead of wandering at will the experience is very structured in terms of the path one takes.

NP: A lot of your team — both behind the scenes and on stage — are veterans of Sleep No More, what should those who are familiar with that work not expect to find here?

DR: This is a tailor-made journey for an audience of one. You will embark entirely alone and every person will have an entirely unique 30-minute journey. My hope is that though the experience is a solitary one, it leads to communal gatherings as people compare their visits to OPTIKA MODERNA and their sightings of La Llorona.

NP: Both of you have worked on a lot of immersive-what is it about this form that keeps you interested?

DR: I think it’s an exhilarating and impactful art form in which you as an audience member feel essential to the performance. I love how your senses and muscle-memory are activated in such a way that you are imprinted by a performance. It’s like traveling to a new country and then returning home transformed by your experience there.

CM: There’s so much that draws me to this type of performance. I really love the intimacy and immediacy of immersive theatre. As a performer (in SNM and other immersive projects) I really loved that I never knew what kind of audience member would essentially be my scene partners on any given night in any given scene. I also really love the way immersive theatre draws from live performance, art installation, sound design, dance, film and many other modalities to create a three dimensional world. This cross pollination of forms is so dynamic and compelling. There’s something incredibly intoxicating about the potency of immersive performance that captivates me in a very different way than traditional proscenium work.

NP: How did you find yourself in San Diego for this show?

DR: My wife Jen and I moved to San Diego from Boston in 2012. I’ve continued to work as a set and costume designer since and had this idea for an immersive La Llorona show for some time. It wasn’t until a series of conversations while designing a show at The Old Globe that I was encouraged to apply for a San Diego Foundation Creative Catalyst Grant to make it happen. Being a recipient has been transformative in that it’s forced me to take this seedling of an idea seriously and to let it germinate. I’ve always considered to be this version to be an appetizer version of a much larger production one day but was curious if the idea had legs.

I’ve known Careena since before our Boston run of Sleep No More and loved collaborating with her. A few years ago, I had lunch with her while she was visiting San Diego and I sheepishly mentioned I wished to create this immersive piece and she said “When it happens, I’m there”. She’s got incredible instincts for this kind of performance work and I feel so lucky to work with her on developing the material with an incredible cast of performers.

CM: In May he reached to me to see if I would be up for coming out to work on it. The timing was also perfect as I was going to be out here performing in the HBO / Westworld Immersive experience at Comic-con right before this project — so it was kind of amazing timing how it all lined up.

NP: The run is extremely limited: are there long term plans, or hopes, for Waking La Llorona?

DR: I think it’s highly likely that, very soon, there will be more appointments to visit with Dr. E.S. Moctezuma at OPTIKA MODERNA.

CM: Stay tuned……..

Waking La Llorona’s initial run in San Diego this August has been booked out, but… well you saw that tease.

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