A powerful family drama examines
the lasting wounds of Vietnam
and the Chicano Moratorium

Some family dramas simmer, others explode, and still others leave emotional shrapnel embedded under the skin long after curtain call. Soul Sacrifice, currently having its world premiere at CASA 0101, does all three.

Written by Consuelo G. Flores and directed by Kenneth Castillo, the semi-autobiographical play depicts the effects of the Vietnam War on a Mexican-American immigrant family in East Los Angeles. Young men in the community are aggressively targeted by the local draft board and sent to the jungles of Indochina, where they become both killers and casualties.

Soul Sacrifice time shifts between 1970 and years later, but the drama’s core is set during the anti-war Chicano Moratorium protests. The family is swept into the violent crackdown on the peaceful march in East L.A. along Whittier Boulevard and Laguna Park on August 29, 1970, including the shock surrounding the killing of journalist Rubén Salazar. Yet this is not merely a history play. It is an indictment of war and of the nation’s habit of feeding working-class youth and immigrant communities into conflicts that have little to do with the lives they leave behind.

At the center is Luie, played by Carlos Pratts in a performance of uncommon emotional transparency. Pratts depicts an older brother and loving son, deftly transforming into a paranoid and damaged victim of war through posture, silence, sudden eruptions, and moments of near collapse. Castillo cleverly intercuts the violence on the streets of East Los Angeles with the violence unfolding in Vietnam. Pratts’ Luie carries Vietnam home, where PTSD is not a condition to be overcome but a specter that continues to haunt his life.

Just as compelling is Myrna Velasco as Connie, who zig-zags adeptly from the ebullient innocence of a child in one instant to the somber reflections of an adult and back again. Velasco stays in the moment, and her Connie feels lived rather than acted.

David Flores as Ben delivers intense energy and remarkably nimble physicality. Flores moves through scenes like a live wire, combustible and headstrong, bringing the political fervor of the Moratorium into his relatively conservative family.

The production is well served by a uniformly committed ensemble that navigates the emotional demands of Flores’s script, which requires rapid pivots between tenderness, rage, fear, and awakening. The script is generally believable and fresh, though occasionally undermined by lines of dialogue that seem designed more to provide historical context than to emerge naturally from the characters themselves.

One particularly effective element is the period music woven throughout the production. Sound designer Angelica Ornelas uses it not simply as nostalgic decoration but as a way to punctuate the emotional and historical stages of the narrative. The lighting by Alejandro Parra, costumes by Mama J. Patricia Tripp, set design by Audrey Szot, and props by Maia Melendez support the storytelling without drawing undue attention to themselves. At two hours without intermission, the play is long, but I found it consistently engaging.

Opening night delivered an extraordinary coda. After the performance concluded, Consuelo G. Flores revealed that the real-life Luie—whose experiences inspired the drama—was sitting in the audience with his family, having traveled from Arkansas to attend. A Vietnam survivor who overcame intense PTSD, he sat alongside children and grandchildren who are themselves part of the story’s living legacy.

The revelation visibly overwhelmed portions of the audience and stirred deep emotions in the cast, especially Carlos Pratts, as the distance between actor and subject suddenly disappeared. Tears were shed.

What lingers most about Soul Sacrifice is its joining of the personal with the political. The play reminds us that wars do not begin or end on a battlefield. They roil kitchens and bedrooms, fueling addiction, broken tempers, and wounds passed from one generation to the next. The casualties are not abstract. They come home.

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photos by Steve Moyer Public Relations

Soul Sacrifice
CASA 0101 Theater
Gloria Molina Auditorium
2102 E. First St. in Los Angeles
ends on June 21, 2026
for tickets and information, visit CASA 0101 Theater

for more shows, visit Theatre in LA

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