About the Play:

Anywhere but Here is a full-length drama by Carmen Aguirre. The "magic-realist play" bends time as a family of Chilean refugees are travelling from Canada back to Chile in their 1970s convertible. They wind up stuck at the U.S.-Mexico border where they encounter characters from different eras, ranging from the 1800s to modern day, while still existing in their 1979 reality. Anywhere but Here chronicles the many paths and timelines we take to discover the truth about who we are, and where we may be headed.

Anywhere but Here is about a Chilean family who travel from Canada back toward Chile sometime in 1979, six years after being exiled from their home country. Two Chilean-Canadian sisters, aged 11 and 12, are yanked from their comfortable life in Vancouver by their father. They drive in a top-down convertible along the desert border between the U.S. and Mexico, each with different emotions about the North they are leaving and the South they are approaching, reversing their refugee flight, refusing the state of exile. Left behind is their mother, who hopes to follow her family there, all the while grappling with her conflicting identities. The trio encounter an increasingly fantastic range of characters from the 1800s, their present-day reality of the 1970s, and a future timeline in 2020. They are encircled by past, present, and future in a collective vision that takes them, and the audience, into the compelling experiences of people crossing and guarding the border. Threaded through the external journey is the internal search for home in an unstable world. With the arrival of the mother of the family, they confront the costs of exile and the true nature of home. Anywhere but Here pays homage to the rich history of magical realism in Latin American literature as its characters attempt to cross and guard borders – surviving what was left behind and all that is still to come.

Anywhere but Here premiered in 2020 at the Vancouver Playhouse during the PuSh International Performing Arts Festival.

Cast: 5 Latine female, 4 Latine male (or at least a very diverse cast)

What people say:

"Anywhere But Here is a glorious ride... [it] is madly ambitious. It's original. And it sets a new highwater mark for Latinx representation in Canada." — Colin Thomas

"Defying both time and space, with raps written by Shad Kabango, Aguirre crosses borders, literally, emotionally, and metaphysically... Anywhere But Here creates empathy around immigration with effective storytelling." — Vancouver Arts Review

"...a uniquely faceted experience, sprawling in its historic scope and significance ... a time-defying meditation on essential journeys of the heart ... Anywhere but Here is unmistakably a seminal Latinx production that shines a light on the ongoing struggles of migration and its many unspoken stories." — Georgia Straight

About the Playwright:

Carmen Aguirre is a Chilean-born Canadian author, actor, and playwright who has worked extensively in North and South America. The founder of the Latino Theatre Group in 1994 and more recently a co-founder of the Canadian Latinx Theatre Artist Coalition, she is now a Core Artist at Vancouver's Electric Company Theatre. She is a prolific playwright whose works include The Refugee Hotel and Anywhere But Here. As an actor, she has over eighty film, television, and stage acting credits.