Event

RITA MORENO IN PERSON!

Dr. Jud Newborn, the CAC's Special Events Curator, will conduct the interview
Thursday, March 7 at 7 pm
Members: $20 Public: $25 Reception Book-Signing

West Side Story is one of the most widely beloved of all movie musicals, and many of the film's most electrifying moments come from Oscar Winner RITA MORENO, especially her performance in the famed America! musical number, and the haunting duet I Have A Love. As her eponymous new memoir reveals, the legendary actress, dancer and singer has had a versatile, award-studded career of unparalleled longevity one characterized by an ultimately successful struggle to overcome the racist Hollywood stereotyping of Latino women. With a youthfulness and vitality almost unbelievable at age 81, this Puerto Rican born artist not only the first Hispanic woman to win an Oscar, but the first actress to win Oscar, Golden Globe, Tony, Grammy and multiple Emmys - is still going strong. Known to entirely new generations through her ubiquitous hit TV roles, she is currently starring with Fran Drescher in Happily Divorced. Before that she memorably starred in The Electric Company on PBS, and the controversial HBO hit series OZ for six years. She also made guest appearances on Ugly Betty, Law and Order, Golden Girls, plus a running role on Where On Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? Her Tony for Best Featured Actress came in 1975 as as Googie Gomez in Terrence McNally's play The Ritz, a role she later repeated in the Hollywood film version. In 2000, she won the Library of Congress Living Legends Award, and later the Presidential Medal of Freedom and The National Medal of Arts. But the weight of multiple honors cannot stop Rita Moreno from performing in cabaret and in her solo autobiographical show, Rita Moreno: Life Without Makeup - a fitting description also for her new memoir, a no-holds barred account of a tumultuous, dynamic and triumphant life like no other.