Latinx Actor Training

Cynthia Santos DeCure is a bilingual actor, and voice, speech, dialect coach specializing in culturally inclusive pedagogies in actor training, accents, and dialects. She is Associate Professor Adjunct of Acting at David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University, certified as Associate Teacher of Fitzmaurice Voicework® and teacher of Knight-Thompson Speechwork. A member of SAG/AFTRA and AEA with over 30 years of acting experience, Cynthia has an M.F.A. in Acting from CSULA and a B.A. in Acting from University of Southern California. She is co-editor of the award-winning anthology Scenes for Latinx Actors. Micha Espinosa is an international teaching artist, activist, and voice/performance specialist in culturally inclusive pedagogies. She is a Professor at Arizona State University School (ASU) in the School of Music, Dance, and Theatre, affiliate faculty with ASU’s School of Transborder Studies & the Sidney Poitier New American Film School (30 year member of SAG-AFTRA), Artistic Director of Fitzmaurice Voicework® (FV®), and Lead Teacher trainer for the FV® Teacher Certification. Micha is also a core member of the performance art collective La Pocha Nostra and the award-winning editor of Monologues for Latino Actors and co-editor of Scenes for Latinx Actors.

Contributor Biographies

Acknowledgments

Forward

Introduction

Cynthia Santos DeCure and Micha Espinosa

Part 1: History and Theory

1. Ancestral Echoes: Excavating Latinx Histories in Actor Training

Chantal Rodriguez

2. Diane Rodríguez’s Acting Activism

Marci R. McMahon

3. "Let Me Define Myself": An Interview with Puerto Rican teatrera Rosa Luisa Márquez

Priscilla Melendez and Aníbal González

4. Actor Training with Global Perspectives: A Historical Narrative of the Only Spanish-Language Theatre Conservatory in the United States

Joann Yarrow

5. Dr. Alma Martinez: A Narrative Towards Becoming a Chicanx Actor

Alma Martinez

6. Performance for Innocents: Live Art Pedagogy for Rebel Artists With Guillermo Gómez-Peña and Luz Oropeza

Paloma Martínez-Cruz

7. Confessions of a Racial Nomad: Indigenous-Mestizx Ethnicity in the World of Eurocentric Performance Practices

Saúl García-López, aka La Saula

Part 2: Acting

8. The Complexity and Poetry of Latinx Identity and Actor Training, a Narrative

Micha Espinosa

9. From Method to Mythic: Why Latinx? Why Mythic? How Mythic? Why Now?

Marissa Chibás

10. The Latinx Actor’s Linguistic Identity: Preserving Our Culture in Speech Training

Cynthia Santos DeCure

11. Accent and Dialect Training for the Latinx Actor

Cynthia Santos DeCure

12. Freeing the Bilingual Voice: Thoughts on Adapting the Linklater Method Into Spanish

Antonio Ocampo-Guzman

13. Towards a Latinx-Driven Physical Theatre Pedagogy: Acrobatic Theatre for Social Change

CarlosAlexis Cruz

14. Experiences in Working with Shakespeare in Adaptation, Shakespeare in Spanish and Bilingual Heightened Text

Cynthia Santos DeCure and Micha Espinosa

15. Navigating the Musical Theatre Industry for Latinx Actors

Julio Agustin

16. School of Autodidacts

Mónica Sánchez

17. The Five Elements

Caridad Svich

18. Afro-Latinas in Conversation: Interview with Debra Anne Byrd, Founder of Harlem Shakespeare and Creator of Becoming Othello

Christin Eve Cato

19. On Latinx Casting: Interview with Peter Murrieta, Emmy Award-Winning Writer and Producer

Micha Espinosa

20. Championing Unheard Voices: Developing the Civic Voice Through Story

Michelle Lopez-Rios

21. Theatre Where You Are

Emilio Rodriguez

22. Strategies for Directing Latinx Plays

Jerry Ruiz

23. Teaching Acting Using the Four Agreements as a Framework for Self-Acceptance and Cultural Connection

Christina Marín

24. Performance of Identity—A Practice

Marie Ramirez Downing

25. Fitzmaurice Voicework® as a Contemplative Practice and Decolonizing Agent in Actor Training

Lorenzo González Fontes

Bendiciones

Index