The Barrack
The Barrack is a theater company founded in 2019 in Hanover College by Alejandra Juno Rodríguez-Villar. The Barrack has the goal of bringing Spanish Golden Age drama to a wide audience through performances and movies in the original Spanish, subtitled in English. A key aspect of The Barrack’s approach is its educational focus: student actors participate in productions not only to perform but also to engage deeply with Spanish language and culture through experiential learning. The company combines artistic practice with pedagogy, inviting others to join and experience theater as a living, immersive form of cultural expression. So far, they have released three tv movies based on Cervantes’s interludes: La guarda cuidadosa, La cueva de Salamanca, and El viejo celoso.
Comedias Sueltas
Comedias Sueltas invites scholars to rediscover comedias through a rich and carefully curated digital environment. At its core, it is a comprehensive database that pairs bibliographic records with images of sueltas, opening the door to fresh lines of inquiry into printing practices and the book trade in eighteenth-century Spain. The physical qualities of these inexpensive, widely circulated texts reveal their accessibility and popularity, offering valuable insight into how audiences encountered and received these plays over time. While the original performances have largely disappeared, these modest printed editions endure in significant numbers, providing a compelling and tangible resource for deeper exploration and renewed scholarly attention.
Dragoncillo Puppet Troupe
Dragoncillo is a puppetry troupe comprised of university scholars specializing in Golden Age Theater: Jason Yancey (Grand Valley State University); Esther Fernández (Independent Scholar); Jonathan Wade (Brigham Young University); Jared White (Hillsdale College); and Alejandra Juno Rodríguez -Villar (Hanover College). The group debuted in April 2018 with a shadow puppet adaptation of the Juan Rana figure from Golden Age entremeses in an original production titled, “The Fabulous Johnny Frog.” In 2024, Dragoncillo won the Walker Reid Comedia Production Prize for their show “¡Quijóteres!” Dragoncillo takes their shows to elementary and secondary schools, as well as universities. Consider reaching out to them to plan a visit to your classroom.
More Than Muses
The mission of More Than Muses, a digital library, is to collect, transcribe, edit, translate, and share literary texts by and information about women writers who lived on the Iberian Peninsula from the Middle Ages through the nineteenth century. The More than Muses project aims to incorporate mentored research into undergraduate and graduate education. In doing so, students acquire proficiency in library research, document collection, editing, analytical writing, in addition to expanding their subject knowledge. The digital library includes information about and works by several women playwrights, including Ângela de Azevedo, Leonor de la Cueva y Silva, María Egual, Sor Marcela de San Félix, Sor María de San Alberto, Soror Maria do Céu, María Martínez Abello, Soror Violante do Céu, and María de Zayas.
Siglo Latinx
Siglo Latinx is a project dedicated to studying twenty-first-century adaptations of Spanish Golden Age comedias created by Latinx artists in North America (Canada, United States, and Mexico) to be inclusive and accessible. The project draws upon the expertise of scholars from various academic disciplines, including cultural studies, social psychology, and critical literary theory, all relevant to the study of theatrical performance. The principal aim is to promote Latinx adaptations and gain insight into how Latinx artists stage and present their works, creating opportunities for socially and collectively transformative encounters. This involves revisiting, appropriating, and adapting the plays according to specific contexts, thus creating more inclusive and diverse spaces for new audiences across multiple generations.