Foundry Member, Foundry Alumna (2019)
Erlina Ortiz is a Dominican-American playwright, performer, and theatre maker from Reading, PA based in Philadelphia. She graduated with a BA in Theatre from Temple University. Her heartfelt and difficult plays on gentrification, domestic violence, and rape culture have been produced with Power Street Theatre Company where she is proud to be resident playwright. Erlina is a member of New Pages, a professional writer’s group with Azuka Theatre Company and an Alumni of The Foundry @ Playpenn. She has received the Amtrak Writer’s residency, the Signal Fire Outpost Residency, and her play She Wore Those Shoes had a developmental reading at Theatre Exile’s Studio X-hibition Series in 2016. She has twice been a finalist for the Leeway Transformation Award. In 2018 Erlina’s play Las Mujeres premiered with Power Street Theatre Company to sold out houses and rave reviews picking up a Bonaly Award for Creation of Community Joy, and this spring her play Morir Sonyando was Barrymore Recommended. Erlina believes being an artist is a superpower, she believes in using her powers for good.