And They Told Us We Were Immortal

Osvaldo “Chacho” Dragún was born in the JCA settlement of Colonia Barro, Entre Ríos, Argentina, and in 1943 he moved to Buenos Aires, where he performed in the Teatro Popular Fray Mocho. A socially committed dramatist, his first performed play, La peste viene de Melos (1956), was about the 1954 Central Intelligence Agency–backed invasion and coup in Guatemala. He left Argentina in 1961 and worked in Latin America, Cuba, and the United States. In 1981, he became a champion of the teatro abierto (open theater) movement, which opposed military dictatorship. In 1988, he founded and directed the Theatre School of Latin America and the Caribbean, based in Havana, and in 1996 took over direction of Argentina’s prestigious Cervantes National Theatre.