Theater Mania Review: Vámonos Is a Snapshot of One Dominican-American Family in the Wake of 9/11

In reviving the outmoded genre of the 9/11 drama, Contreras proves that earlier attempts (most of which weren’t very good) were entirely premature. With two decades of hindsight, Contreras crafts a narrative that is informed by national trauma without losing focus on the human beings before us. No grand pronouncements are made regarding America’s role in the world, nor does the playwright indulge in the kind of cheap prescience that attempts to draw a line from that turning point to the present moment. Instead, Contreras captures the truth of 2002, which is that most people turned away from CNN in favor of their own personal dramas and desires.

“Now, watch this drive,” President George W. Bush says during one of Bulbarella’s sharply curated video interludes. If even the commander-in-chief cannot be distracted from his busy schedule of leisure, why should anyone else?

Certainly, the characters of Vámonos have places to go and things to achieve. Florentino delivers a compelling portrayal of a woman on the move: a new American citizen (and possibly a Republican) who still speaks to her sister in Spanish but has become less tolerant of Juana’s little cabinet of Santería above the white refrigerator (Contreras never flinches in her realistic presentation of language, with the older characters speaking to their children in Spanish, and them answering back in English). As Juana, Peralta forcefully and unsentimentally embodies a character who is less mobile, left behind by husband and now sister, fueling her resentment with glass after glass of Carlo Rossi. Her cruel confrontation with Yoira (Reynoso makes us feel her rage and heartbreak) is one of the tensest points of the play.