Growing up in the portal of Santa Monica, California with my heart tied to Tepatitlán and Pegueros, Jalisco, México, I’ve been in search of stories like and unlike my own since encountering the concept of identity, especially its interpretation in the US. With a zealous appetite towards theater and the accessibility of film, I endeavor to satiate and acknowledge my own identity of moving parts when confronted with the many people thinking that I, as a white appearing Mexican-American, am oxymoronic.
Quickly, I learned that my internal identity never seemed to match my external appearance in the eyes of the media, nor within the media's dominant narrative. In search of more portrayals of the complex and nuanced human experience, film and theatre became my forms of escapism via the accessibility of Public Library DVDs, allowing me to explore stories while searching for myself in them. However, even with that joyful wave of escapism, how long can you escape before you feel invisible? With the lack of media talking about complex stories I’d craved to discuss, I refused to believe I was alone, even when I had nothing to contribute towards cultural conversations. Finding CINDERELLA (1997) in my family’s VHS cabinet, my hopes experienced a tangible shift. Even with no Spanish speaking or Latiné actors – nor discussions of culture, race, and ethnicity – I was able to see versions of my family’s nuances and shades on screen without investigations for proof of existence and relationships. CINDERELLA (1997) was scratching that itch of storytelling and conversation that I wanted to contribute towards. Within my career, I hope to contribute to media by developing stories; focusing on what I desired as a child through the creation of a collaborative production company incorporating accessible film, television, and theater. I hope to create a positive impact so the next generation– and our inner child – can feel seen, heard, and understood. For if we have our inner child validated, we can begin to discuss how the world we lived in the past will be far from the world we strive to create.
Akin to Jorge Luis Borges’ poem “BORGES AND I”, questioning public persona vs the private self, my work investigates multi-layered dynamics of society. My short play STATUE OF LIMITATIONS exhibits this sentiment where the Statue of Liberty, Lady Justice, and Civic Fame learn Roe v. Wade was overturned. Similarly, my in-progress full-length play – PRO-THRIVE – presents an AFAB person seeking PCOS blood work from Planned Parenthood but encounters pro-life protesters blocking and disrupting under assumptions. However, these aren’t the exclusive threads connecting my works together. My full-length play – THE OTHER IN THE ROOM – deals with othering from a child’s perspective and turns othering on its head by having the othered carry the multilingual narrative, dually including people in experiencing what it feels like to be othered without shutting them out.
The guidance of the human story is something I must contribute to and witness. Learning how stories can be formed on the page and brought to life on stage and screen alike is something I’ve intrinsically had a fervor in exploring. I just feel the need to go through that creative process with collaborators, so the text is a separate entity from me and that there is another voice in the room.