Act 1
The curtain rises to the soft sounds of "El Coqui." In the center of the stage there is single spotlight. Into that light walks a young child, Salvador Agron. His mother Esmeralda enters and places a collate around his neck. His adult self enters and watches. As the child is led away, his teenage persona emerges from the shadows to replace him.

Sal, the teenager, is joined by his gang The Vampires. Salvador watches and comments on his life and what he has learned in "Born In Puerto Rico." Salvador states that he wants the world to understand where he came from, so he has written his life story. He begins telling it with the departure of his father when he was a child. His mother takes him and his older sister Aurea to El Asilo de los Pobres while she works.

In El Asilo, young Salvi is beaten by the nuns for wetting his bed. His sister Aurea runs and find their mother. She threatens the nuns for beating her son and then takes her to children away. She is advised to visit the Santero to see what the future holds for them. The Santero throws the shells and is told her son will murder if he moves to New York.

Esmeralda cannot believe this prophecy and says it won't happen. She takes her children on top of a mountain and holds them close as she says with determination that the prophecy is wrong.

A few years later the family has moved to New York, as the santero said. Sal is laying on top his rooftop, trying to escape the heat and his stepfather's abusive home. His stepfather orders him down and his mother and sister beg him to listen. He ignores them and goes down to the street where some of the local girls are hanging out. Bernadette and Cookie come onto him. Local gang leader Luis Tony Hernandez tells him to ignore them and join up with their gang. After all, you either belong to a gang or you get hurt. But he's more interested in the girls, especially Bernadette. He tries to get her to go off with him, but just as she agrees, he is face to face with the Redwings, an Italian gang that beats him for using the word "wop."

The Vampires run to his defense and chase off the Redwings. Sal is taken to their lair where they entice him to join their gang once again, telling him, "You know it takes a strong man to survive. It ain't no accident that you're still alive." His stepfather interrupts the scene, telling him once again to come inside. He refuses. A an argument ensues where his stepfather slaps him and tells him he's stupid and young. Sal pulls a knife on him and tells him to get out of his life - he'll never beat him again. His stepfather leaves and Sal joins with the gang. They take him shopping for new clothes, where he steals his red and black cape.

Back at the poolhall where the Vampires stay, Carlos is trying to undress Yolanda. She tells him of her dreams of owning a restaraunt one day. He promises her that it will happen. Bernadette watches and is joined by Sal, who shows off his newly stolen cape to her. Their revere is interupted by the arrival of Luis and the other Vampires. He changes the song to the more upbeat "Quality."

During the song, Frenchy Cordero arrives badly beaten. The Vampires go to attack. Yolanda begs Carlos to stay, but he leaves. They arrive a park in Hell's Kitchen where three teenagers are standing. The girl is thrown out. Salvador enters and watches as Sal stabs the two boys to death. The gang runs and people begin to arrive. The music changes into "The Manhunt" for Sal.

Everyone is shouting "Kill the spics!!" and crying for capture and conviction of Sal and the gang. He is captured and shouts things at the camera, ignores his family and tells the press, "I don't care if they fry me. My mother could watch me burn."

The next scene, "Can I Forgive Him?" shows a woman lighting a candle in a church. It is Mrs. Young, the mother of one of the victims. Esmeralda Agron enters and introduces herself. She asks for forgiveness for her son, but Mrs Young explains that it's impossible. She is seconded by the other boy's mother, Mrs Krzesinski (Luba Mason). Esmeralda begs, "Only god can say forgive, his son, too, received the knife. But we go on. We have to live with this cross we call our life." The mothers do not listen and leave the church ignoring Esmeralda's pleas.

The first act ends with "Adios Hermanos." Sal and Luis are in chains and facing the death penalty. Salvador watches from the side and his sister Aurea watches from her home. She begs for her brother's release, but it doesn't happen. He has been sentenced to death and faces it with all the bravery he can get together, telling everyone "Adios, hermanos" before they take him away.

ACT 2

Act 2 opens with the announcement that Sal's life has been spared. The curtain rises on the small pentacostal church that Esmeralda and Aurea belong to. Aurea shouts, "I want to than the lord whose mercy is a rainbow of comfort to my mother. I want to thank the governor who heard the lord's command to spare the life of my brother." The entire church joins in with "Jesus Es Mi Senor," but the mood is ruined by Sal's stepfather, who says that Sal is evil and didn't deserve to live. "His sole is black and the vermin of his name brought everlasting shame to Puerto Rico." Aurea takes his bible and says he isn't worthy of it, then throws it back at him calling him a hypocrite. Esmeralda mirrors her daughter's sentiments and says she is leaving him.

At home Esmeralda dictates a letter to her son, which Aurea writes. On a Sunday afternoon, she dictates her letter and she explains all the problems a Puerto Rican woman faced at the time from the language barrier to her longing to go back to Puerto Rico to just the sadness and failure she feels in her life.

Meanwhile, Sal is undergoing changes in prison. He grows from an illiterate boy into a grown man. He has to face who he is and whom he wants to become. He has learned to write and answers his mother's letter. He tells the world, "I'll take the evil in me and turn it into good, though all your institutions never thought I could." He ends by becoming Salvador. Salvador tells him "I'll keep your image with me till the day I die" as Sal leaves into his memory.

Salvador receives a letter from a native american woman named Wahzinak. She has read his writing and finds it quite inspiring. They become pen pals, eventually falling in love. The other prisoners laugh at him and his education. He tries to defend himself, but is pushed down by Virgil, a guard at his prison. He is angry that Sal can get a good education off the government after he was convicted of murder, but his children can't when they've never committed a crime.

Salvador escapes from his tauntings by writing to Wahzinak. They're in love now and Salvador would love to be with her. A video shows a clip of the real Salvador Agron at the same time period speaking about his change into a new person. When it ends, Sal comes out and stands behind Salvador. He says he has come to say one thing: "I just wish that I could hug you, you're my only defense." He sits down and explains why he did what he did and doesn't apologize, but rationlize with himself before leaving as suddenly as he came.

Virgil continues to harass Salvador. Salvador insists on seeing the Warden about his parole. He says he has five months left as long as he doesn't mess up. Salvador cannot stand it anymore. He decides he cannot wait the five months. Instead of taking the bus to college, he takes the trailways bus to Arizona.

Along the way, he lays down in the desert and falls asleep. Around him a dream of his childhood emerges. El Malecon, the beach where he and sister used to play begins to fill the desert. He is lost in this beautiful dream, but it's interrupted by the arrival of Sal upstage, flaring his cape to the sounds of the yoruban chant the santero said before his fate was read. The Vampires walk on and rise above Sal. They shake his hand, give him a slap on the back, then a kick in the stomach as they tell him how "You Fucked Up My Life." Sal defends himself, saying he didn't do it. "You were all the gangbang, there were other guys with knives. But I'm the only murderer when the Irish judge arrives" and "Stick it to the jibaro, he's dumb enough to brag. He don't kiss ass to no courtroom with the fucking american flag." Salvador comes forward and says, "I am an innocent man and I paid you with my life. I've got nothing to gain, I have done my time. And whether or not I have committed this crime, in the eyes of the world I am the Capeman now - For the rest of my life. They won't hear any of it. He insists by Saint Lazarus that he is innocent.

Saint Lazarus limps on to help Salvador realize who he is. Sal slowly backs away at the sight of the saint. He faces Salvador, telling him he must confess to himself or he'll never find happiness. Salvador cannot accept it. He says, "I know remorse would be river in the desert of my heart... but my tears won't start." Sal says he breaks the chain and the pain that it brings. He throws his collate on the ground and turns to leave. He is face to face with the mothers of his victims. They sing, "16 years and still I weep and wish that I had died that day. I've grown weary in my steps, but I cannot turn away. Every year I light a candle on the day that he was born for the life he never tasted, for his children never come." Saint LAzarus comes from the other side and tells him how he'll be alone and cold and unfeeling in his home if he doesn't repent, the chorus swells into a chant of finding salvation. Salvador cannot stand it. He falls to his knees and it rises around him. He ends up in the place he started. He awakens and everyone is gone. He wonders if it was a dream. He grabs his neck. Around it is the collate. He stands and walks off.

He turns himself in and three years are added to his sentence. Wahzinak writes her final letter, telling him how she is no longer allowed to communicate with him and had to bury his letters.

In 1979 the "Puerto Rican Day Parade" goes through New York. Salvador is standing off to the side, listening to it as it passes. Children hold their flags and sing "El Coqui" as their teacher teaches the words. He makes a phone call to Yolanda, telling her that he'll be by soon to pick up his papers. Tony Hernandez enters the phone booth next to him and surprises him. They tell each other what has been happening in the past few years since Hernandez's release. It's a bittersweet reunion and ends with Hernandez telling Salvador, "I'm glad I seen ya, write a big best seller and may god accept our souls."

Salvador goes to the party of Carlos and Yolanda. They have their restaraunt, like she always wanted. Carlos gives Salvador his book. Salvador also sees his sister again. She takes him to their mother.

Esmeralda is alone in the Agron home. Salvador enters and hugs her. She serves him his meal. He tells her that it was his fault that everything happened and he finally realizes it. She tells him, "It is repentence that makes good from evil." She goes on to explain a dream she had where an angel allowed him into heaven. Throughout the song, she sees her son at all his stages in life from a child, to a teenager to the adult Sal. She accepts each one into her arms, not caring what he went through, since he has come to a full circle with his life. She tells him, "The angels both were male and softly spoken. Their hair was lightened by the sea and sun. They carried a chain, the chain was broken. Then they laid it at my feet and they were gone."