Left to right: Evelyn Howe, Jessica Pimentel, Yesenia Iglesias; photo by Marc J. Franklin.

Written by Ricardo Pérez González
Directed by David Mendizábal
Featuring: Jessica Pimentel, Yesenia Iglesias, Evelyn Howe, Susanna Guzmán, José Ramón Rosario
Voice of Radio: José C. Massó III
Fight Director and Intimacy Coach: Ted Hewlett

March 26 – April 27, 2025
The Huntington Calderwood
527 Tremont Street. Boston, MA 02116

Content warnings: Don’t Eat the Mangos includes frank discussion of past sexual assault, incest, and traumatic forced abortion. The play includes depictions of patriarchal control in a family setting, at-home end-of-life care, and violent suffocation. There is a brief discussion of suicide and the inclusion of homophobic and sexist slurs.

This play is performed in English and Spanish. 

BOSTON — After the first seeing the striking mango tree (designed by Tanya Orellana with rising sunlight designed by Cha See) burdened with tangibly ripe fruit next to a cozily busy cottage, the audience hears the silence-splitting call of the Puerto Rican coquí frog. (I’ve never been to P.R., but I’ve heard the coquí’s invasive rant from inside my family’s home on Big Island, Hawai’i enough times to recognize the frog’s plaintive call for nonrecreational booty even in my nightmares.) 

The sound design by Jake Rodriguez layers the persistent morning call of coquís under the clanging of daily housework in Don’t Eat the Mangos’ first moments. Shortly after the first lines of dialogue, a ringing bell joins the coquís call. These sounds, with director David Mendizábal’s staging, plus the tense character work between the actors, indicate that something is not right in this house. 

This mutherfucker right here. 

Ko-KEE, they scream in disharmonious unison. Ko-KEE, all night long until you fall asleep or lose your mind. Ko-KEE, your life and your garden belong to the frogs now. If you hate them, you’ll hear them everywhere. That’s one heck of a harbinger of tragedy.

Ismelda (a heroic Jessica Pimentel) manages her family’s home with grace and indomitable patience. Her house is small and worn, but it appears hale: well-stocked and comfortable. This is important because its aging occupants require great care. Mami (Susanna Guzman) has cancer and receives weekly treatments, and Papi (Jose Ramon Rosario, who plays the role with ferocious despicability) is confined to a wheelchair. So, it is up to Ismelda to make sure dinner gets on the table before Mami gets hungry and before Papi throws an epic man-tantrum to ruin their days. 

Ismelda is joined in the kitchen by her sisters Yinoelle (Yesenia Iglesias), a housewife and co-caretaker, and Wicha (Evelyn Howe, last seen at The Huntington in Yerma), an activist and educator, for a family dinner just before a hurricane hits their house in Puerto Rico. The sisters love each other and their mother but fear retribution from their disabled father even as adults. As the rains hit the metal roof of the house, the women share the secrets of family violence they’ve been keeping since childhood. Over a few short days, we learn why their family should never, under no circumstances, eat the mangos growing in their garden.  

Don’t Eat the Mangos, like many plays, has many themes. Puerto Rican political ambiguity is one of them. Domestic violence is another.  There are layers of PTSD worked into Ricardo Pérez González’s play. Director David Mendizábal enhances it through equally as layered character work and ominous staging: A bell rings in the first 20 minutes of the play, and the family stops what it is doing. The bell rings again, and the family shares a tense look. It’s the kind of look a spooked family shares when it knows emotional unrest is nigh. We don’t know why the bell has meaning, but we aren’t keen to find out. 

After their family dinner, Ismelda sharpens a machete in the backyard. We don’t know if it’s used to cut back the garden weeds or if it has more sinister uses. It’s a large knife, after all. Even skilled technicians slip. Sometime after that, after a revealing conversation with Ismelda, Mami hefts the machete in both hands. Mami is too weak to cut back the foliage but too angry to put the machete down. People who work with their hands know that some tools serve many purposes, and the human body is fragile. 

The human body and mind are fragile. Ted Hewlett’s fight direction protects the bodies of his cast and the minds of his audience. This show could not have been easy to prepare for, and I thank Hewlett, The Huntington, and its cast for taking the precautions they could. The current presidential administration wants to silence stories like this. We can’t let them. 

Don’t Eat the Mangos is a horror-comedy. It discusses domestic violence, toxic patriarchal abuse, and the shameful burden of secrets. In the play, as in a vast majority of real-life instances, one man perpetrates the abuse upon the four women in his home. To retain a semblance of peace within their home, the four women keep his abuse secret for decades. Not only does the patriarch maintain an emotionally violent psychological stranglehold on his adult family, the adult women perpetrate more violence on their patriarch once they learn each other’s dark secrets. If this content is triggering for you, PLEASE reconsider purchasing a ticket. I found it hilarious when the patriarchal psychopath finally faced the consequences of his actions. Retribution can be fun! But a whimpering patron a row behind me didn’t have as great a time. Take good care of yourself and make the best choice for your mental health.   

This is not a family show, although it is a show about a family. That being stated, if a girl is old enough to experience sexual abuse or incest, she is old enough to know she is at risk. Keeping sex education from girls will not protect them. It is better to arm them with knowledge than it is to let them learn false information on their own. 

Don’t Eat the Mangos tells us to believe women and girls. Or else.

Abusers are gonna abuse. The majority of sexual abuse victims are female, and the majority of abusers are male. A United States government PDF titled “Quick Facts: Sexual Abuse Offenders” confirms this. It says, “93.6% of sexual abuse offenders were men.” Society shames women into silence to prevent men from facing the consequences of their violence. In most states in the U.S., abortion is not protected. Even where it’s legal, like Puerto Rico in some instances, according to the Center for Reproductive Rights, shame and cost prevent women and girls from accessing necessary healthcare. Pregnant people are at greater risk of domestic violence. 

If you are a victim of abuse or know someone who is, here are a few resources that may help you. You are not alone.  #MeToo

• Mass.gov has resources for survivors of domestic violence. 
• Boston Area Rape Crisis Center (BARCC): https://barcc.org/
• Safelink: Statewide Domestic Violence Hotline: (877) 7885-2020
• Llámanos: Statewide Spanish Rape Crisis Hotline: (800) 233-5001
• The Network/La Red: 617-742-4911 (voice) • 800-832-1901 (Toll-Free)

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