Playwright - Fred Rohan Vargas
Fred Rohan Vargas is the author of several full lengths, one acts and children’s plays. He holds a MFA in dramatic writing from New York University. Prior to receiving a fellowship for graduate school, Mr. Rohan Vargas began his theatre career by starting a dance theatre company for youths that got his fifty young performers to appear in places like Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, Pittsburgh’s Performing Arts Center and Cami Hall with great jazz artists, Dizzy Gullespie and Horace Silva. After passing his gauntlet as a director to his successor, Mr. Rohan Vargas became a radio announcer for WSTA in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands. It wasn’t until he put on his first production of his play WHY DE DONKEY SO STUBBORN that he discovered his true love for the theatre world. The islands allowed him to explore more of his Caribbean roots. There, he was able to learn the power of language and what it can do on stage.
Although he continued to hone all aspects of his writing skills, most of his energies were placed in his works as a copywriter and public relations director in Philadelphia. After leaving those two professions and returning to New York in 1981, Mr. Rohan Vargas furthered his playwriting skills by enrolling in NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. For several years he has worked with theaters such as the Puerto Rican Traveling Theatre and the New Federal Theatre in which he received a grant by the New York State Council on the Arts’ Theatre Commissions for his play CRYSTAL which was produced in New York to open the Latino Experimental Fantastic Theatre's millenium season.
Other citations for his works have come from various festivals such as The Riant Theatre (1996-99), Love Creek Productions (1995, 96 & 98), La Mama Experimental Theatre Company (1999) and First Stage (2000). Mr. Rohan Vargas most recent productions were his two plays in Fort Worth Theatre’s Annual Hispanic Playwrights Festival in which he won first prize for his one act play entitled ACCENT in July, 2000. As a playwright-in-residence of Third Step Theatre (1991-1993) and Artist In Search of…Inc.(1995-1996) and Stageplays Theatre Company (1998- 2000) , he has been able to further develop his writing career.
Currently, Mr. Rohan Vargas teaches for the Board of Education of New York City. In 1990 he received an Impact II grant from the Board of Education to have his children’s musical, THE BIG EYED GORILLA, produced for middle school students.
Mr. Rohan Vargas has served on the theatre/dance grant’s panel for the Queens Council on the Arts, the panel of judges for the Daytime Emmy Awards sponsored by The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and the Board of Directors of the New York Children’s Theatre.
Mr. Rohan Vargas is a member of the Dramatists’ Guild and will do commissioned work on any subject for theatre, film and television.
Writers Research Service
Playwrights on the Web
Latino Entertainment Promotions
Hispanic Organizations of Latin Actors
International Theater Cooperative
Send E-Mail to: faasr4@hotmail.com
Copyright © 2001 Fred Rohan Vargas. All Rights Reserved