{"id":88478,"date":"2026-03-12T12:14:35","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T19:14:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/?p=88478"},"modified":"2026-03-12T12:16:00","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T19:16:00","slug":"theater-news-our-dear-dead-drug-lord-at-the-garage-theatre-is-about-teen-girls-and-pablo-escobars-ghost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/eat-see-do-2\/do\/theater-news-our-dear-dead-drug-lord-at-the-garage-theatre-is-about-teen-girls-and-pablo-escobars-ghost","title":{"rendered":"Theater News: \u2018Our Dear Dead Drug Lord\u2019 at the Garage Theatre is about teen girls and Pablo Escobar\u2019s ghost"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><em>Welcome to Theater News, a regular column by longtime reviewer Anita W. Harris. Look for it most Thursdays. Or\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/newsletters\">sign up<\/a>\u00a0for our Eat. See. Do. newsletter to get it in your inbox.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Kicking off its 26th season, The Garage Theatre is staging \u201cOur Dear Dead Drug Lord\u201d \u2014 Alexis Scheer\u2019s dramatic comedy about four teen girls in a Florida treehouse in 2008 obsessed with Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Directed by Skylar Alexis \u2014 making her directorial debut at the theater \u2014 the play sees the girls talking about school and boys in the privacy of their treehouse and, oh yeah, performing a s\u00e9ance to communicate with Escobar\u2019s spirit, including animal sacrifice.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Alternately funny and gruesome, the play is notable for portraying a world exclusively of young women (except, of course, the drug lord\u2019s pervasive spirit). It\u2019s also reminiscent of Arthur Miller\u2019s 1952 play \u201cThe Crucible,\u201d about the 1690s Salem witch trials, when more than a dozen women were executed for \u201cwitchcraft\u201d in early-American Puritan society.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The girls in \u201cOur Dear Dead Drug Lord\u201d act subversively in a similarly patriarchal world. In the privacy of the treehouse, they can explore sex, death and the supernatural, with the dead drug lord\u2019s ruthless and violent power contrasting their own feelings of disempowerment.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cBut what happens when their idea of fun and games turns into something they never bargained for?\u201d the theater asks. \u201cNo one said growing up as a girl would be easy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The theater adds an advisory that the play contains strong language, strobe effects, herbal cigarette smoke, depictions of drug use and mentions of self-harm, sexual assault, animal abuse, animal death and abortion.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The play is a \u201cwild rollercoaster ride that blurs the lines between imagination and reality, girlhood and womanhood,\u201d the theater says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Director Alexis further adds, \u201cWith what is happening to our Latina\/o communities across the country right now, we hope this show reminds you that you are seen and safe here at The Garage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u201cOur Dear Dead Drug Lord\u201d continues through April 4 at The Garage Theatre, 251 E. Seventh St., Long Beach, with shows Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. Tickets range from $23 to $40, with two-for-one tickets on Thursdays using code TWOFER. For tickets, visit <\/em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thegaragetheatre.org\/\"><em>TheGarageTheatre.org<\/em><\/a><em> or purchase from the box office 30 minutes prior to each night\u2019s performance.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The play is a \u201cwild rollercoaster ride that blurs the lines between imagination and reality, girlhood and womanhood,\u201d the theater says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":207,"featured_media":88479,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[32367],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[32310],"class_list":["post-88478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-do","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/207"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88478"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88478\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":88482,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88478\/revisions\/88482"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88478"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=88478"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=88478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}