by Eliana Theologides Rodriguez
directed by Miranda Cornell
May – June 2026
Linda Gross Theater
In the summer of 2008, five young girls of color and their white fathers attend a program designed to bond families through handmade activities, camp-like adventures, and a heavy dose of cultural appropriation. But where can these girls turn when the program sparks questions that their fathers are unable – or unwilling – to answer? Inspired by the playwright’s experiences in a father-daughter program of the same name, Indian Princesses is a tender satire that explores the stories we tell, the histories we omit, and the truths that live inside us, waiting to come out.
Indian Princesses is a brand new play that marks the Off-Broadway debuts of both Eliana Theologides Rodriguez and Miranda Cornell.
You may have heard of the Indian Princesses or Indian Guides program, which still exists today throughout the US as a father-child bonding program. Though the mission of the program is wholesome––helping fathers and children bond through earthy adventures, hand-made ceremony, and intentional community-building––its reality is a complete bastardization of Native American culture, appropriating sacred practices and garb for the fleeting enjoyment of majority white families.
The phrase “Indian Princess” itself embodies this dissonance: a constructed fantasy by white settlers, she is an imaginary sidekick invented to retell the brutalities of American history as a G-rated narrative, appropriate for audiences of all ages.
It wasn’t until I reflected on the program as an adult that I realized the irony of my participation in it. My mom’s side of the family is of Yaqui and Tewa descent, but her relatives were forced into assimilation school, which forever severed them and future family members from Native community and culture, and which is why today, I do not self-identify as Native. The never-ending American colonization project robbed my family of our heritage, then aestheticized, repackaged, and sold that heritage back to us generations later as a family-friendly after-school activity.
I do not possess any remnants of the sacred dress or artifacts of my ancestors, but I do have a faux-suede vest with the YMCA logo and some plastic-beaded dreamcatchers. I do not know a word of my ancestors’ languages, but I remember every word of our 2008 tribal chant. In other words, I cannot call myself Native, but I can call myself a YMCA-certified Indian Princess.
– Eliana Theologides Rodriguez
Indian Princesses was developed in part through the Terrence McNally New Works Incubator in partnership with The Terrence McNally Foundation.
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