McMaster’s first playwright-in-residence has won a Hamilton Arts Award for theatre.

Playwright and director Marilo Nuñez was the founding artistic director of the Alameda Theatre Company in Toronto, which was dedicated to the development of Latinx playwrights. She moved to Hamilton from Toronto three years ago.

Since May, Nuñez has been working with third-year students in the Theatre & Film Studies program as part of an initiative funded by McMaster’s Socrates Project, a multi-year endeavour that sponsors debates, art exhibits and other events that highlight the role of the liberal arts at McMaster and beyond.

Exploring the idea of “Democracy and Dissent” – one of the Socrates Project’s themes for the year – Nuñez and the theatre students have been working through the initial development of a piece of devised theatre that will be the program’s major production in November.

Devised theatre is a creative technique that involves collaboration between actors, designers and playwrights, often using improvisatory exercises as a basis for developing a script.

“Devised theatre is very democratic,” says Nuñez, who is currently working on an MFA in creative writing at the University of Guelph. “Because traditional theatre is based in a colonial background, I believe in using our current voices. The students have a lot to say, and when they bring that to our work, it makes the work more relevant to them and to audiences as well.”

Based on her collaborative work with the students, Nuñez will use the summer to craft a script, then start working with students again in September.

For Nuñez, the child of Chilean exiles, art should be political – a way to question assumptions and challenge the status quo. And she brings that approach to her work at Mac.

“The work that moves me pushes boundaries, asks questions, and really creates a dialogue about what our world is today,” she explains. “Working with the students has been amazing – they’re very open, and they definitely have their own ideas about what they want and what they think about the world. The ideas that they’ve brought to the table have been incredible.”

Peter Cockett, an assistant professor in the Theatre & Film Studies program, has been working closely with Nuñez and points out that her work dovetails nicely with the ideas behind the Socrates Project, which was launched following a $2-million donation from Chancellor Emeritus Lynton (Red) Wilson.

“There couldn’t be a more perfect crossover from Marilo’s approach to theatre and what the Socrates Project is all about,” Cockett says. “The notion of questioning assumptions and challenging authority is completely what the Socrates Project is supposed to be doing.”