The Nun and The Countess

The Nun and The Countess – Based on the novel Sor Juana’s Second Dream by Alicia Gaspar de Alba. Co-Directed by Corky Dominguez. This is the story of the passionate romance between Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz, a 17th Century Mexican nun and the Countess Maria Luisa de Paredes, Vicereine of Mexico. Odalys Nanin stars as legendary Mexican nun Sor Juana, who wowed a Countess (played by Genevieve Joy and alternate Lee Ann Gutierrez) with poems that still live today.

Sor Juana is considered the most prolific poet of the golden age and the first feminist of the new world. She was named the tenth muse (the Sappho of the Americas). She was a musician, playwright and a Lesbian trapped in a nun’s habit. The poems to Lysi (Countess de Paredes) are woven into the dialogue of the play offering the audience a window into their intimate relationship in the confined world in which they lived. These are soul mates who are in a predicament where society’s rules forbid the consummation of their love.