learning how to read by moonlight
A World Premiere Production
May 14 - 31, 2025
In Partnership with
Written by Gaven Trinidad
Boston Center for the Arts, Plaza Theatre (539 Tremont St, Boston, MA)
Under the moonlight, six-year-old Eddie imagines a dragon eating moons and an imaginary friend teaching him English. His mother smokes as she prays to a statue of the Santo Niño. His father waits alone in Manila for their daily phone calls. Songs from a mythical giant turtle travel across oceans, but are drowned by the voices of Duterte and Trump on the television. As the War on Drugs in the Philippines and the Anti-Immigrant movement in the U.S. threaten their humanity, the family learns how to articulate unspoken truths that will either break them or heal them.
How will the weight of living in this world force them to reevaluate their understanding of community, dreams, and sanctuary? To spotlight Boston's own community leaders and activism, a new narrator (a fellow artist, community organizer, or elected official) joins the storytelling every night. The play is spoken in English and Tagalog with subtitles.
tickets coming soon!
At CHUANG Stage, tickets are "Pay-As-You-Are" to provide radical access to theatre for those who identify as working-class immigrants of Asian American descent, a population in Boston underrepresented in arts and culture patrons. When you "Pay-As-You-Are," we empower you to select the ticket price that best reflects your socio-economic status and take action in community accountability to make arts accessible for all.
CAST AND CREATIVE TEAM
Gaven D. Trinidad (they/he/siya) is a first-generation Filipinx American dramaturgy, playwright, director, and educator from NYC. Their artistic work examines the intersections of race, language, immigration, queerness, ritual, community, and futurity. They taught undergraduate courses on the work of contemporary BIPOC playwrights at the University of Massachusetts Amherst under the mentorship of Dr. Priscilla Page. They’ve had the privilege to collaborate with folx in various artistic and administrative positions at places such as New York Theatre Workshop, The Juilliard Drama Division, Musical Theatre Factory, Ma-Yi Theatre Company, Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, Roundabout Theatre Company, 2nd Stage, and National Queer Theater. Selected plays: Learning How to Read by Moonlight (BAPF Finalist 2021), novena (Eugene O’Neill Playwrights Conference Semi-Finalist 2024), Mercury Makes the Skin Glow. Selected dramaturgy credits: The Duat (The Philadelphia Theatre Company, PlayPenn), PreP Play, or Blue Parachute (National Queer Theater, NCTC), June is the First Fall (Yantze Repertory Theater), Collidescope 2.0 (Ping Chong + Company). Selected directing credits: Joker (National Queer Theater), Are You There Truman? (Pride Plays, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, The Parsnip Ship, Leviathan Lab), Sa Aming Puso (Global Forms Theatre Festival, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, New York Theatre Salon). B.A. American Studies, Dickinson College; M.F.A. Dramaturgy, UMass Amherst. Proud former public-school teacher in Memphis, TN with Teach for America. Theatre Communications Group named them a 2021 Rising Leader of Color. Playwriting Groups/Fellowships: Orchard Project Greenhouse Lab; The Shelter NYC; Playground NYC; Ma-Yi Writers Lab; The Parsnip Ship Play Club. As someone living with bipolar disorder, they are an advocate for Mental Health Awareness. www.gaventrinidadtheatre.com
