With echoes of Death of a Salesman, nods to A Raisin in the Sun and Long Day’s Journey Into Night, even a flash of Awake and Sing!, The Other Americans—John Leguizamo’s ultra-traditional, ultra-ambitious, over-ambitious family drama at the Public Theater—defies expectations from the start.
It’s not what we’ve previously seen from the playwright/solo performer behind comic tours de force including Spic-O-Rama (1992), Ghetto Klown (2011), and Latin History for Morons (2017). Some of us can still picture him in the body-hugging dress and giant hoop earrings as Manny the Fanny in Mambo Mouth (1990).
With The Other Americans, Leguizamo is writing for an ensemble: He’s given himself the plum part of Nelson Castro, a Colombian American patriarch and laundromat owner who’s just moved his family from the racially diverse, heavily Latin American and South Asian enclave of Jackson Heights, Queens, to the more homogenous (read: white) Forest Hills, with its manicured lawns and Tudor-style homes. “Forest Hills is the upgrade we deserved,” he reminds his wife, Patti (a fierce Luna Lauren Velez), who’d much rather be hanging with her friend Veronica (Sarah Nina Hayon) on Junction Boulevard in what her husband calls their “ghetto-ass” old neighborhood.
[Read Michael Sommers’ ★★☆☆☆ review here.]
He’s also given himself a huge challenge. Nelson is a real pendejo—probably every day, but even more so today when they’re waiting for their son, Nick (Trey Santiago-Hudson, son of the play’s director, Ruben Santiago-Hudson), to return. Bit by bit, we eventually learn Nick was in a hospital, somewhere, for nearly a year after an attack that wreaked massive emotional, and certainly physical, harm.
Nelson is genuinely sweet to Patti but completely clueless if something doesn’t concern or benefit him (he’s three feet from the stove and can’t smell the sofrito burning?); casually cruel to his soon-to-be son-in-law, Eddie (Bradley James Tejeda); dismissive of his daughter, Toni (“The only reason I had kids was pa’que they could give me grandkids,” he tells Eddie, and gracias a Dios that Toni isn’t around to hear it); solicitous toward his sister, Norma (Rosa Evangelina Arredondo), but only because he’s hitting her up for a loan.
And he’s protective of, resentful toward, and full of expectations for Nick as soon as he walks through the door. When Nick mentions anxiety, Nelson pounces. “Anxiety? What do you got to be anxious about? You got a fridge full of food, you don’t pay rent, and everything’s free here.” And when Nick suggests talking about the incident that precipitated his hospital stay, the words “doctor” and “therapy” shut Nelson down immediately. “No, honey, no, we don’t need to do all that. And I’m sorry but I think your shrink’s way off.” Big sister Toni (Rebecca Jimenez) does her best to run interference, but Nelson’s petty-mindedness, fueled by multiple pre-dinner hits of rum, is insurmountable; he can’t even handle Nick beating him in a dance battle.
Both thanks to Leguizamo’s writing and portrayal, Nelson is familiar, and believable, in so many ways: He’s the businessman who’s all vision but no execution, and the patriarch who’s too proud to acknowledge failure. While Nick is in many ways a mystery, Santiago-Hudson beautifully navigates the character’s delicate emotional balance—the about-to-erupt anxiety bubbling beneath the surface, alongside a glimmer of sometimes forced optimism. (Though some of Nick’s details prove completely extraneous: Talk of a girl he met at the hospital and his out-of-left-field decision to be a choreographer leads nowhere, except to a couple of tired jokes.)
Also familiar and believable: every inch of Arnulfo Maldonado’s filled-to-the-brim set. The kitchen is a spot-on re-creation of 1998—how many of us had the Avocado Green oven, the Harvest Gold refrigerator, the orange Formica countertop, and the gold and white linoleum floor?
Ruben Santiago-Hudson manages some gorgeous, emotion-filled (and emotion-draining) moments along the way—including one scene awash with complete silence, and another brought to life by a spontaneous dance between Nestor and Patti. And though Leguizamo deserves credit for a genuinely gasp-inducing second-act plot twist, unfortunately, we can see the ending coming all the way from Forest Hills. To borrow a metaphor from the playwright’s beloved New York Mets, The Other Americans is a big swing. Of course, you don’t always have to hit it out of the park; sometimes, you just have to connect.
The Other Americans opened Sept. 25, 2025, at the Public Theater and runs through Oct. 26. Tickets and information: publictheater.org
