The Diane Rodriguez
Teatrista Award

Patricia is the Producer and Director of Los Angeles Programs at Los Angeles Performance Practice (LAPP) supporting the production and presentation of contemporary performance. Before joining LAPP, they served as the Director of Programs and Engagement at the Network of Ensemble Theaters (NET). A former member of the artistic staff at Center Theatre Group (CTG) for over a decade, Patricia had the honor of working alongside CTG Associate Artistic Director Diane Rodriguez for six years. Together they engaged world-renowned international and local companies on multi-year projects focused on collective and ensemble creation.

The inaugural award recipient was selected by a group of seven nominators: Amelia Acosta Powell, Jacqueline Flores, Anne García-Romero, Lisa Portes, José Luis Valenzuela, Abigail Vega, and Karen Zacarías.

Adriana Gaviria is an actress, voice-over artist, writer, director, advocate, and creative producer. She has performed at regional theaters across the nation—most notably Yale Repertory Theatre, Dallas Theater Center, Denver Center, Arizona Theatre Company, Pasadena Playhouse, Marin Theatre Company, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and Miami New Drama as well as with numerous theater companies in New York. Television/Film: “Law & Order: CI,” “Person of Interest,” “Sueños.” She is Founding Member/Co-Artistic Director of The Sol Project, Producer of SolFest, and serves on the executive team as Director of Technology and Innovation at Parent Artist Advocacy League. She is Founder of North Star Projects, an arts initiative hoping to create a better world, one project at a time. Advisory Boards: 50 Playwrights Project, FIU Theatre Alumni. Steering Committees: DRAMA, Latinx Theatre Commons. Training: NALAC Advocacy Leadership Institute, NALAC Leadership Institute. BFA, Florida International University; MFA, The David Geffen School of Drama, Yale University. Member of The Actors Center, SAG-AFTRA and AEA. Adriana embraces the human spirit and aims to empower, inspire and build community through her work.

The selection committee for the 2023 award included inaugural recipient Patricia Garza; Diane’s husband, Jose Delgado; Chantal Rodriguez; Jacky Segui; and Eric Swartz.

Miranda Gonzalez, born and raised in the city of Chicago, is a writer, director, producer, facilitator, and organizational strategist with a Bachelor of Science from DePaul University, and has co-created addressing anti-blackness in the Latiné community. Currently the Producing Artistic Director for UrbanTheater Company (UTC) in Humboldt Park, she has curated and led numerous interdisciplinary projects that blend theater, music, dance, and oral history to tell the stories of Chicago’s history that mirror her identity and lived experience. Also a collective member of Culture Change Lab, she helps support arts organizations, funders, and lobbyists in reimagining collective structures through operational management. Concurrently, she serves on the National Latinx Theater Initiative Steering Committee advocating for the advancement of Latinx artists and organizations, influencing policy. In 2020 she was invited to record a TEDx talk “The Fear of Decolonization”. With a deeply rooted history in ensemble practice, she was a founding member of Teatro Luna and has devised and developed plays since 2000. Recently selected to participate in Disney’s Live Entertainment (DLE) 2024 Creative Intensive, Miranda was able to collaboratively present new entertainment concepts world-wide. Her most recent play Back In The Day: an 80’s House Music Dancesical had its World Premiere at UrbanTheater Company. Her current project Mascogos, a play that discusses the history of the underground railroad to Mexico, has been in development as a part of the Los Angeles Latino Theater Company’s Imaginistas cohort formed in early 2021. Directing, writing, and script development credits include; Evolution of a Sonero by Flaco Navaja, Remote Learning Curve by Albany Park Theater Ensemble, Thank You for Coming. Take Care by Stacey Rose at Court Theatre, Ashes of Light by Marco Antonio Rodriguez, La Gringa by Carmen Rivera; Teatro Luna Productions S-E-X-Oh!, Lunaticas, Crossed, GL 2010, The North/South Plays a workshop at DCASE; F.O.P and Crime Scene Chicago with Collaboraction; and Melissa DuPrey’s Sushi-Frito at Free Street Theater. She is also an Executive Producer for the web series 50 Blind Dates with Melissa DuPrey and has written for web series Ruby’s World Yo created by Marilyn Camacho. Recipient of the Leaders for a New Chicago Award, 3Arts Award and the International Centre for Women Playwrights 50/50 Award. Visit https://linktr.ee/chiblaxican if you’d like to learn more!

The selection committee for the 2024 awardee included Jose Delgado, Olga Garay-English, Patricia Garza, Adriana Gaviria, and Jacob Padrón.

Alexandra Meda (she/Ella) is a nationally recognized cultural strategist, artistic director, and transformation architect working at the intersection of ensemble-based praxis, systemic change, and collective restoration. With a foundation in devised theater, stage direction, and an expansive practice that spans strategy, facilitation, and immersive experience design, she guides institutions through moments of reckoning, realignment, and radical reimagining.

Her approach is shaped by over two decades of experience in ensemble and collaborative creation. As Artistic Director of Studio Luna, a Latinx and Women of Color ensemble formerly known as Teatro Luna, she develops immersive, emotionally charged performances and new plays that center marginalized stories, provoke dialogue, and invite collective transformation. Her artistry, rooted in rigorous process and joy-infused collaboration, remains the blueprint for how she approaches systems change.

As founder of Culture Change Lab, Meda partners with organizations across sectors to build new systems rooted in justice, care, and creativity. From Sundance Institute, Harvard's American Repertory Theater, and Yale University, to The Walt Disney Company, New York Stage & Film, Center Theater Group, and A.R.T./New York, she has supported teams through courageous transitions; restructuring leadership, redesigning governance, repairing harm, and embedding equity into every layer of their work. Across every context, Meda holds complexity without collapse. Whether designing shared leadership structures, producing gatherings and festivals, facilitating and mediating change or harm reduction efforts, leading strategic planning, she helps move from fragmentation to coherence, with integrity and imagination.

She is a founding year artEquity facilitation training alum and recently co-produced their 10th anniversary Alumni National Gathering.  Meda also serves as the co-producing director for the Network of Ensemble Theaters, an Executive Committee member of Twenty43, and a former Impact Director at the National New Play Network. She works with Penumbra Theatre's Center for Racial Healing, served as an advisory member of the Theatre Communications Group's Accountability For Abundance National Initiative and TCG's Thrive re-granting program, and is a board member for the André Cailloux Center for Justice + Performing Arts, Theater Communications Group, and Michael’s Daughter Foundation. She was a steering committee member of the Latinx Theater Commons from 2014-2020. You can read more about her directing work at www.alexandradirects.com

The selection committee for the 2025 awardee included Dolores Chavez, Jose Delgado, Gina Sandi Diaz, Miranda Gonzalez, and Debra Padilla.