Rita Moreno spoke at convocation this afternoon. She sang in the middle of her speech and sounded beautiful. The theme of her speech "If you quit, you can't." I found this easily relatable and a good reminder for my own goals.
When Rita was younger her dad left before her and her mom moved to the states. It was just her and her mom moving to America. When she first saw the statue of liberty, she called it the "green lady." She thought the "green lady" ran the country and was enamored by this fact. They first moved to the Bronx and her mom rented a four bedroom apartment but there were already a couple of families living there when they arrived. So eventually, they moved to a different apartment across the street that was very small.
Her mom always reminded Rita to follow her dreams. She listened to her mother when she quit secretarial school to pursue her dreams as an actress and singer. She did a performance where a talent scout saw her and was so in awe of her performance that he put a word in for her at the MGM. This talent scout set up meeting for her to meet people that could offer her a contract. She was offered a seven year contract and she took it. Throughout this time, she was given dusky-women roles and dusky performances. These roles objectified women as being inferior and not having as much of a say in society.
There were no dialect coaches for her to learn from so she tried to come up with her own accents. She came up with a universal ethnic accent. She started to truly learn the meaning behind acting, and becoming another person since the characters were not true to how women truly were. Luckily, she soon went to a make up studio at MGM (Metro Goldwyn Mayor) and "learned that the eyes are more than just gateways to the soul." She said that room could have been sweating from the inside out because Marlon Brando was so gorgeous. She soon saw him as more of a narcissist and righteous in his own way. She felt obligated to please him and compliment him since he was so well known.
Eventually, she was offered her role as Anita in West Side Story. This was the first time she had a role where she could voice her opinion and wouldn't have to worry about sugar coating the role. She could be closer to who she truly was. This very much helped her career because her and her mother were very poor.
Reflecting on this experience, it was amazing to learn about someone's past and struggles who has won so many awards because she never gave up on her dreams. This is inspirational to me as I can relate to her family and financial troubles. It is my aspiration to always follow my dreams as it can clearly take you in the right direction.
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