Maria Irene Fornes was born in Havana, Cuba. At that time, the politics and economy of Cuba was in upheaval, and not until 1945 (and after the death of Fornes' father) was she able to immigrate to New York City with her mother and only one of her five siblings. During her childhood--both in Cuba and the United States--Fornes was enthusiastic about the arts. Once in New York City, she learned English and worked as a translator.
When Fornes was 19 years old, she began formal training in painting, studying abstract art. In 1954, she met Harriet Sohmers, an artist's model and writer. They began a relationship, and Fornes followed Sohmers to Europe to continue her studies in painting. While in Paris, she saw a French-language production of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot. Even though she did not understand French, the performance left a powerful impact on her, and she soon recognized the transformative nature of theatre.
Fornes returned to the United States in 1957 (her relationship with Sohmers over), and in 1959 met writer Susan Sontag. During her relationship with Sontag--known for her cultural essays and activism--Fornes began to write plays. Her first plays was The Widow (1961), based on letters from her cousin to their great-grandfather. Her next play, There! You Died! (1963, later titled Tango Palace) utilized absurdist ideas and dramaturgy, focusing on the existential struggles between two allegorical characters. In 1965, Fornes won her first Obie Award for Promenade.
Throughout her career, Fornes plays broke and experimented with expected dramaturgical structures. Fefu and Her Friends (1977) deconstructed the notion of the accepted theatre space by having the audience move throughout the building to watch scenes. Mud (1983) examines the dynamics of three interconnected and "stuck" characters. Sarita (1984) dramatizes the struggle between accepted moral values and personal sexual desires. The Conduct of Life (1985) won an Obie Award; it synthesizes and exposes the intersections between domestic violence and national violence. Fornes continued writing until 2000, when her play Letters from Cuba, an autobiographical work, won an Obie Award. In her later years, she did very little writing or public appearances, largely because of Alzheimer's Disease. She died in 2018.
Maria Irene Fornes was a vital and dominant figure in the American dramatic landscape. Her experimental works led the avant-garde of off-off-Broadway; many of her plays got their start at La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club. Playwrights from Tony Kushner to Paula Vogel to Edward Albee credit Fornes as an influence on their own work. Famously, Tony Kushner stated: "Every time I listen to Fornes, or read or see one of her plays, I feel this: she breathes, has always breathed, a finer, purer, sharper air."
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