National Network for Equitable Library Service

Political passions and sexual identity are delicately intertwined in this bittersweet tale of stolen youth. Set in Salvador Allende's Chile, Léo follows the path of three friends who journey from innocence to understanding as they learn what it means to truly ‘disappear'; Rodrigo, the idealistic aspiring politician; Léo, the passionate young poet; and Isolda, a young woman adrift in her own life. Set in Santiago, Léo is a one-act play told from the perspective of Léo, a twenty-year-old pleasure seeker, who has become one of the desaparecido (disappeared) after the Chilean government is overthrown with the assassination of the president, Salvador Allende, in the military coup d'etat of 1973. From a childhood world of first loves and fast friendships, Léo makes the journey through an abruptly terminated adolescence into a world where innocence itself too often becomes desaparecido.