Podcast Interview with Ramon Verdugo & Jessica Bauman

In this episode, Ramon Verdugo and Jessica Bauman share about their work with La Frontera Project and how theatre can be a tool for building bridges. They discuss the complexities of this kind of work and how the arts can play such an important role in sharing a much more nuanced depiction of a reality than is often depicted.

Ramón Verdugo is the Artistic Director of Tijuana Hace Teatro since 2007. As an artist he has collaborated in more than 30 shows, as a director, actor and producer. University professor for theatre and acting programs for opera singers. With experience in seminars and festivals such as ASSITEJ (China), Odin Theatre (Denmark), Fira Infantil I Juvenil (Spain), ITI (Armenia), among others in Mexico and United States. For over 10 years he has codirected the THT Binational School of Audiences and Festival Interprepas for youth theatre groups. Cofounder of Festival de Teatro Íntimo.

Jessica Bauman is a community engaged theater maker, director and teacher. Her production of Arden/Everywhere - a reimagining of Shakespeare’s As You Like It as a refugee story - ran in Off-Broadway, with a cast of both professionals and non-professional immigrant actors from nine different countries. She has worked with immigrants and displaced people in New York City, Tijuana and Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. Jessica is a recipient of a Theater Communications Group/Mellon Foundation Travel Grant to support her collaboration with Tijuana Hace Teatro.

Interviewers: Molly Todd, PhD student in the ASPECT program; Jon Catherwood-Ginn, PhD student in the PGG program