Josefina López, whose first play was produced when she was eighteen, has become one of the most widely produced Latina playwrights in the United States. Her outrageous sense of humor softens the harsh emotional settings of her Chicana-driven plays. In her work she reveals the culturally repressed passions and needs of Chicanas in an effort to achieve healing and transformation.

Born on 19 March 1969 in Cerritos, San Luis Potosí, Mexico, María Josefina López is the sixth of eight children. She moved to the Boyle Heights area of Los Angeles when she was about five years old; her mother, Catalina Perales, had to use the birth certificate of an American-born girl to get López across the border. Her father, Rosendo Z. López, already had his green card, as did her mother. Subsequently, López attended Breed Elementary School...