“She is a terrific and fearless playwright with an individual and astute voice,” Gidron said. “She has a versatility, and there is always something very truthful about it. The characters can be very surprising, but they are truthful and you recognize them.”

Alfaro also wrote and co-produced a short documentary titled “Japanese American Women: A Sense of Place.” The film focuses on Alfaro and 12 other Japanese-American women as they struggle to find a place in a society dominated by stereotypes. Alfaro said she felt race-based hostility while at Berkeley, and that this experience influenced her  focus on  Japanese-American issues. Although much of Alfaro’s work focuses on Japanese-American identity, she has also dealt with subjects ranging dramatically from Greek mythology to biographical pieces based on figures such as Martha Mitchell and Pablo Picasso.

“They’re real and full of her humor and unique commentary,” Boulukos said of Alfaro’s plays. “They are always enjoyable.”

Currently, having just turned 71, Alfaro continues to write every day and is in the midst of her latest play about an Asian-American professor at Harvard on the cusp of old age. “When you write, everything in your life falls through the filter of the play. Sometimes it’s hard [to] extricate yourself,” Alfaro said.

Her latest play, which symbolically brings Alfaro back full circle to her days at Radcliffe, is a testament to that.

—Staff writer Erika P. Pierson can be reached at epierson@fas.harvard.edu.