Rita Moreno has been breaking boundaries for more than eighty years.
Rita Moreno
Early on, she faced frustration as she fought for roles worthy of her talent; eventually, however, her persistence, hard work, and greatness were properly recognized, yielding the most coveted – and the most! – awards an entertainer could dream of.
When Rita was six years old, in 1936, her mother Rosa, a seamstress, moved her to New York City from her native Puerto Rico. An immigrant with few resources arriving in the U.S. in the depths of the Great Depression with dreams of making it big? Why not. By age nine, she was dancing professionally. By eleven, she was dubbing Spanish-language versions of U.S. films. At fourteen, she co-starred with a young Eli Wallach in “Skydrift” at the Belasco. It took her all of eight years, as a child, to make it to Broadway and the big screen; not bad. But that was just the beginning of a life bucking the odds.
Not only is she the first Hispanic woman to win an Oscar, she is one of only a handful of actors to win all four major awards – an Oscar, Tony, Emmy and Grammy. She is perhaps best known for the unassuming children’s show on PBS, The Electric Company. Others may know her for her Academy-Award performance in the film adaptation of West Side Story. The dichotomy reflected in those two iconic roles is indicative of the breadth of Moreno’s career.
By the time she turned 19, she’d begun appearing in small roles in films. To her chagrin, she was often cast as the stereotypical Hispanic woman or the “exotic,” often in Westerns, and often barefoot. Or, she’d be cast as the sexpot: she graced the cover of Life magazine in 1954 under the provocative title, “Rita Moreno: An Actresses’ Catalog of Sex and Innocence.” Continuing to battle ethnic and gender stereotypes, her “triple-threat” versatility served her in good stead, landing such divergent roles as a starlet in the musical Singing in the Rain, soon followed by an uncredited appearance in that ‘memorable’ film, Ma and Pa Kettle on Vacation.
Her break-through role – one that not only made use of her singing, dancing, and acting skills, but also her experience as an immigrant on the mean streets of New York – came when she was tapped by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins for the pivotal role of Anita in West Side Story. As Anita, Moreno showed Hollywood and the world a Latina who was a three-dimensional character, showing off her powerhouse voice and dancing prowess one moment in the much-loved “America” while revealing her vulnerability in a rape scene the next. She became one of the few Latina household names. Breaking boundaries.
Expecting a new awareness and appreciation of her range as an actress after grabbing an Oscar, she learned the hard way that Hollywood was not ready to look past her ethnicity, and continued to offer her demeaning, one-dimensional roles. Her response was to return to the stage, developing her reputation as an actor who could “do it all.” And when she was ready to return to Hollywood, she was able to write her own ticket, and did, with a controversial appearance as a prostitute in the film Carnal Knowledge, while concurrently charming kids and their parents on PBS’ The Electric Company. Wow.
One sees her nowadays almost anywhere one turns, from Jane the Virgin on TV, to her autobiographical one-woman show, Rita Moreno: Life Without Makeup, or as the voice of Mimi in the animated film Rio 2. Moreover, she’s become an activist raising awareness of osteoporosis. Her list of awards has grown accordingly to reflect her status as a national treasure: She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2004; the American National Medal of the Arts in 2010; and a Kennedy Center Honor in 2015.
Rita Moreno has gone from barefoot stereotype to one of the most accomplished and respected individuals of all time. And in the process, she’s removed those boundaries for future generations.