Leonardo Crusoé

Leonardo Crusoé is an actor, director, dramaturgist, producer and environmentalist from Salvador, Brasil. A member of Acerola Theater Company with a degree on Theatre Directing from the Federal University of Bahia, Crusoé develops his artistic work from a queer and Third-Worldist perspective, drawing on the Theatre of the Absurd and performance art to construct political narratives that engage with the Global South and question the mechanisms of capitalist power.

He made his debut as a dramaturg and director with his production Jacinto Morto (2023), a play about desire reflected in a queer and interracial couple, which ran for over a year. He created the street performance leonardo-jesus-carranca (2024), questioning family relationships and the excessive consumption of animal protein. In 2025, he wrote and directed the solo piece Karina, based on the African Diaspora that shapes Brazilian racial mixing and on birth control through surrogacy laws; he published the play Enterrar Francisco in book form and performed in Coco Loco, directed by the Canadian artist Camille Banville. 

Crusoé is currently working on an adaptation of Madame de Sade, combining Vogue and Dramatic Corporeal Mime within dissident gender expressions in the dramaturgy of Yukio Mishima, scheduled to premiere in Brasil at the end of 2026.