Paul S. Flores

PLACAS: The Most Dangerous Tattoo

Written by Paul S. Flores  

Developed with and Directed by Michael John Garcés

Touring Production Directed by Fidel Gomez

In street culture, placas (barrio slang for body tattoos) signify an individual member’s unswerving loyalty to the gang and serve as a mechanism to create a new identity. 

PLACAS: The Most Dangerous Tattoo was born from a commission Flores received by the Central American Resource Center (CARECEN-SF) and the San Francisco International Arts Festival to write a play humanizing Central Americans impacted by violence and stereotyped as violent, gangbanging, murderous people.

The play developed as a pro-active community response to the issue of transnational gang violence, presenting positive elements of Central American culture in the context of a hostile, anti-immigrant political environment. As part of the writing process Flores interviewed over 100 gang members, parents, and intervention workers in the Bay Area, Los Angeles, and El Salvador and with the consulting collaboration of ex-gang member Alex Sánchez, founder of the Los Angeles non-profit Homies Unidos. 

PLACAS is a bilingual tale of fathers and sons and transformation and redemption that illuminates one man’s determination to reunite his family after surviving civil war in El Salvador, immigration, deportation, prison and street violence. Flores approached Ric Salinas, a founding member of the critically acclaimed performance group Culture Clash, to play the main character, Fausto Carbajal.

Using Fausto’s tattoos as a metaphor, PLACAS explores the process of tattoo removal as one possible path for former gang members to move forward. Laser tattoo removal is a complicated and painful procedure that can take years to conclude, and it is especially risky for ex-gang members because their former comrades see it as betrayal and may target those who seek treatment. Partly because of this risk, gang prevention workers— police, probation officers, judges, and case workers—consider tattoo removal as a legitimate step for gang members to reintegrate into civil society.

PLACAS toured nationally in Washington DC; Oakland, CA; Salinas, CA; Los Angeles, CA; Tulsa, OK; Denver, CO; and New York City, including productions at the Lorraine Hansberry Theater, South Coast Rep, Los Angeles Theater Center, and CASA 0101.

PLACAS was co-commissioned by MACLA, Su Teatro, Pregones/PRTT, and GALA Theatre through the National Performance Network and sponsored by the Central American Resource Center, Homies Unidos, Homeboy Industries, National Compadres Network, The Unity Council and The California Endowment.

Running Time: 97 mins (not including 15 minute intermission.)