3 Tips to Help Young Actors Make Better First Impressions

To find out three tips to make better first impressions on audition, read Denise Simon's blog in Backstage by clicking here.

HOLA Member Bochinche

Bochinche refers to “gossip”. In this sense, we use it to mention HOLA members or Friends of HOLA who are getting acting, performance or similarly artistic gigs and/or recognition in the media. The names of HOLA members and Friends of HOLA are listed below in boldface. To see what other HOLA members are doing currently, click here.

Houses on the Moon Theater Company is presenting its second annual benefit. Noted jazz vocalist Patti Austin will perform and an award will be institued in honor of and the memory of company member, the late Mauricio Leyton, shown at right. The Leyton Award will henceforth be awarded annually. The benefit will take place on Wednesday, April 2, 2014 at The Cutting Room, located in midtown Manhattan. For more information, click here.

Daniel Anthony Hidalgo will be acting in Mark Schultz's Deathbed. The play is directed by Brent Buell, it will be presented in April at the Theater Row Studio Theater Row in the theater district of midtown Manhattan.

E3Outlaws Productions will be presenting Reyes y Reyes. Based on William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, the musical is adapted and directed by Enmanuel García Villavicencio and will run in April at the Red Carpet Theater in Manhattan's El Barrio neighborhood. The production stars Paul Montoya, Claudio Weisz, Zulaika Velázquez, Yanet Betances and Diana Pou.

Kiki Meléndez is returning with another evening of the critically acclaimed comedy show Hot Tamales Live. The show, which she produces and hosts, features an evening of comedians (usually female comedians and one male comedian). The next incarnation will take place on Sunday, March 9, 2014 at the TLC Chinese 6 Theatres in the Hollywood area of Los Angeles. For more information, click here or here. 

Centro Español is presenting Voces de marzo. A celebration of the contribution of Latinas in New York, it will happen on Friday, March 7, 2014 at the Centro's eponymous location in Manhattan's West Village and feature the talents of Laura Riveros, Inma Heredia and Elena Mohedano.

Tony Award winner Priscilla López, shown at left, will star in the new play Somewhere. The dance-filled theater piece written by Matthew López (no relation) will be directed by Giovanna Sardelli, feature original music from Tony Award winner Bill Sherman and choreography by Greg Graham and run in April and May at Hartford Stage in Hartford, Connecticut. To read more about the production, check out this blog in Playbill Online by clicking here, or by going to theater's website by clicking here.

Éric-Dominique Pérez can be seen playing British officer Neil Campbell in the Travel Channel series "Castle: Secrets & Legends" in an episode profiling Napoleon Bonaparte's escape from Elba. To see a clip of the episode, click here. 

If you are an HOLA member or a Friend of HOLA and want to submit a bochinche item, send us an e-mail. If you live in the New York metropolitan area and want to be an HOLA member, why not join? If you live outside the New York metropolitan area and want to be an HOLA member, you can find out more information on how to do so, by clicking here. If you are not a Friend of HOLA, why not become one?

HOLA Member Bochinche

Bochinche refers to “gossip”. In this sense, we use it to mention HOLA members or Friends of HOLA who are getting acting, performance or similarly artistic gigs and/or recognition in the media. The names of HOLA members and Friends of HOLA are listed below in boldface. To see what other HOLA members are doing currently, click here.

Luis Salgado, shown at right, was the subject of a profile in Puerto Rican newspaper El Nuevo Día, where he was interviewed being in the cast of the Broadway show Rocky: The Musical (written by Stephen Flaherty, Lynn Ahrens and Thomas Meehan, based on the screenplay of the Academy Award-winning film by Sylvester Stallone). The musical is directed by Alex Timbers (with choreography by Kelly Devine and boxing choreography by Stephen Hoggett) and is currently in previews at the Winter Garden Theatre. To read the article (which is in Spanish), click here.

Edna Lee Figueroa was the subject of a profile in the Puerto Rican newspaper La Semana, where she spoke of her career as an award-winning actress in New York. To read the article (which is in Spanish), click on the photo at left. [By the way, HOLA, or La Organización Hispana de Actores Latinos (as it is billed in Spanish) received a mention in the article.] For more information, click here or here.

Barefoot Theatre Company is presenting a workshop presentation of the Mel Nieves play In Da Boogie Down. Featuring the poetry of Craig (muMs) Grant and directed by Paula Pizzi-Black, the presentation is part of that theater company's renowned bareNaked Reading Series and will take place on Tuesday, March 4, 2014 at the WestBeth Community Room in Manhattan's West Village. For more information, click here, here or here.

Joel Pérez booked a voiceover for McDonald's.

If you are an HOLA member or a Friend of HOLA and want to submit a bochinche item, send us an e-mail. If you live in the New York metropolitan area and want to be an HOLA member, why not join? If you live outside the New York metropolitan area and want to be an HOLA member, you can find out more information on how to do so, by clicking here. If you are not a Friend of HOLA, why not become one?

HOLA Member Bochinche

Bochinche refers to “gossip”. In this sense, we use it to mention HOLA members or Friends of HOLA who are getting acting, performance or similarly artistic gigs and/or recognition in the media. The names of HOLA members and Friends of HOLA are listed below in boldface. To see what other HOLA members are doing currently, click here.

Academy Award-nominated actress Rosie Pérez, shown at right, has just published a memoir. Titled Handbook for an Unpredictable Life: How I Survived Sister Renata and My Crazy Mother and Still Came Out Smiling (And With Great Hair), it is published by Random House and recounts her turbulent childhood and how she became a dancer, then choreographer, then actress. She was profiled in the New York Daily News regarding the memoir. To read the article, click here.

Ángelo Mercado, Jr. booked a role on an episode of a new, as yet untitled program on the Investigation Discovery (ID) network.

J.F. Seary will be returning to the stage with Soledad Speaks. Written and performed by Peggy Robles-Alvarado, Meriam Rodríguez, María Rodríguez and Seary, the spoken word piece was created and directed by Linda Nieves-Powell and curated by Robles-Alvarado and Seary. It will be presented at the Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance (BAAD!), located in the Bronx's Westchester Square area in March as part of its BAAD! Ass Women Festival. For more information, click here or here.

TEBA is presenting Ramón Del Valle Inclán's Las galas del difunto. Adapted and directed by Héctor Luis Rivera, the play will be presented in March at the Broadway Blackbox Theater in Manhattan's Washington Heights neighborhood and feature Telba Cavero, Nicolás Díaz, Hermilo Galicia, Enmanuel García Villavicencio, Alex Manzano, J. Edgar Mozoub, Raúl Rivera, Kathy Tejada and Claudio Weisz in the cast. For more information, click here.

Anthony Ruiz can be seen in a new commercial for the New York State Lottery. The commercial can be seen below.



If you are an HOLA member or a Friend of HOLA and want to submit a bochinche item, send us an e-mail. If you live in the New York metropolitan area and want to be an HOLA member, why not join? If you live outside the New York metropolitan area and want to be an HOLA member, you can find out more information on how to do so, by clicking here. If you are not a Friend of HOLA, why not become one?

New Study Proves Diversity Officially Sells, So It's Time Hollywood Cut The Crap

It's a vicious cycle. The industry likes to present itself as this bastion of liberal thought. But when it comes to diversity, it's one of the worst industries in this country. The idea that [the underrepresentation of minorities and women] is all about economics has been taken off the table. –Darnell Hunt of the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies at UCLA

Cast of the Netflix series
"Orange is the New Black"

Check out this blog by Alanna Bennett in Bustle regarding the new study from the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies at University of California-Los Angeles which states that television programs with a high degree of nonwhite characters in its cast have the highest ratings (and analogously, the films with a high degree of diversity in its cast earn the most revenue) by clicking here.

El Blog de HOLA in Latin Heat for its series on Television for U.S. Latinos

El Blog de HOLA's two-part series of blogs highlighting the number of television networks marketed toward U.S. Latinos (plus the challenges in doing so and how to avoid some of those challenges) were republished in the Los Angeles-based industry publication Latin Heat Entertainment. 

To read the blogs in Latin Heat, click on the links below.

Television for U.S. Latinos (Part 1: What Is Out There?)

Television for U.S. Latinos (Part 2: Trying To Reach Your Audience)

Guest Blog: Comcast Swoops on Time Warner

CALL TO ARMS, GENTE

By Louis Perego Moreno (Tío Louie).

For many, Comcast acquiring Time Warner Cable is not a welcome prospect–– and no reason for a pity-fest since its reputation is well-deserved. This just reinforces the conglomeration of media companies in the U.S. and its monopolization, which counter a diversity of perspectives that is crucial to an ever-evolving democracy. Latinos per se, have never had a lovefest with Comcast. And this has not been enhanced with their content acquisition of NBCUniversal, despite owning Telemundo and mun2. For more information on the merger, click here.

It should be no surprise that the Comcast-NBCUniversal merger was initially challenged by over 1,100 filings. I know, because at the time Kathryn Galán as Executive Director filed an official one from the National Association of Latino Independent Producers (NALIP), as well as I representing the NALIP-NY chapter as President.

Though the merger went through a year ago, the affinity towards Comcast-NBCUniversal has not endeared themselves to the Latino community with the recent cancellation of NBC Latino and dropping the NCLR's ALMA Awards for 2014. Ironically, not only have they gained the disdain of Latinos but to a broader market in which both Comcast and Time Warner are considered the most unfavorable companies in the most unfavorable industry.

Good luck to consumers and we can only hope that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will be looking out for us... for a change.

Guest blogger Louis Perego Moreno (Tío Louie) is an interactive content producer and educator who for 32 years has owned Skyline Features, a bilingual multimedia and educational production company developing documentaries, television programming and advertising commercials featuring Latinos, Blacks, Women, Urban Youth and LGBT. He has trained 1,500 Latino and African American youth over 10 years to produce 70 documentary shorts. For documentary features he was the producer and director of Latina Confessions (2010) and co-producer of American Dreams Deferred (2013) on PBS.