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Valdez brings stylish ‘Zoot Suit’ to Gammage

Get ready to strut.

El Teatro Campesino’s 25 th Anniversary National tour of “Zoot Suit,” by Luis Valdez will be presented at 7 p.m. , Sept. 25 at Gammage Auditorium.

Based on the infamous 1942 “Sleepy Lagoon” murder mystery and the resulting “Zoot Suit Riots” in Los Angeles , playwright Luis Valdez weaves fact and fiction to depict the fate of 22 young Mexican Americans brought to trial for a murder they did not commit.

“Zoot Suit” brings together unforgettable characters such as the irreverent El Pachuco and the charismatic Henry Reyna, an unsuspecting gang leader who finds himself caught in the middle of the racially turbulent events that rocked Los Angeles during the early 1940s.

Valdez says this production exemplifies the evolution of American society.

“The essence about the American experience is about cultural fusion,” Valdez says. “’Zoot Suit’ has influences that were brought on during the evolution of jazz, when you saw African American talent mixed with the American experience. The Hispanic influence is amplified through the story, style and attitude, which are really influences that every culture can relate with.”

Created by playwright Luis Valdez, “Zoot Suit” made its world premiere in 1978 at the Mark Taper Forum where it ran for an unprecedented twelve-weeks. “Zoot Suit” broke all attendance records at the Taper and subsequently moved to the larger Aquarius Theatre in Hollywood to accommodate audience demand. Coinciding with the Hollywood run, this critically acclaimed production opened on Broadway in 1979. In 1981, Valdez adapted “Zoot Suit” for the screen and then directed the Golden Globe-nominated motion picture version starring Edward James Olmos and Tyne Daly.

Despite his success in film, Valdez says nothing compares to creating and acting in a theater production.

“It’s very gratifying to get the immediate reaction from the audience,” he says. “Many young playwrights tend to want to move toward making movies, mainly because of the potential to reach a world-wide audience. However, you can’t see your viewers’ reactions.”

At the age of 6, Valdez got his first taste of theater when he was cast to play a monkey for his school’s production of “Christmas in the Jungle.”

“I use to bring my lunch in a paper bag and I remember when we were getting ready to prepare for the play, my teacher took my bag, ripped it up and used it to make papier mache,” he recalls. “We made masks for our costumes out of paper mache; and I got a monkey mask made from my lunch bag. I also got a tail and I remember our costumes were really nice, made with nice material. I was so excited.”

Valdez never got to perform in his school play because the week before the play, his family, who were farm workers, were evicted from their home and had to move.

“They play went on without me,” he says. “I never got to act and I was very disappointed. That event created this hole in me; and I think from then on I’ve been trying to fill it through my work.”

Valdez’s experience in a farm worker family provided much encouragement and drive when he founded El Teatro Campesino. In 1965, Valdez left the San Francisco Mime Troupe to join Cesar Chavez in organizing farmworkers in Delano, Calif. Valdez organized the workers into El Teatro Campesino (The Farmworkers Theater) in an effort to popularize and raise funds for the grape boycott and farmworker strike.

In 1968, El Teatro Campesino left the fields in a conscious effort to create a theater that reflected the greater Chicano experience. A year later, El Teatro Campesino garnered national attention with an Off-Broadway Obie Award and the Los Angeles Drama Critics Award in 1969 and 1972. After touring the international theatre circuit with critical acclaim, the company settled in San Juan Bautista , Calif. in 1971. El Teatro Campesino first produced “Zoot Suit’s” new staging in October 2002 at their San Juan Bautista home adding three extensions for sold out audiences.

El Pachuco Inc., a clothing company out of Los Angeles, designed all costumes for the production. Valdez says the zoot suit is as symbolic as his theatre production.

“Zoot suits have clean lines and they are shaped in the inverted pyramid, which when you think about it presents the appearance of being lighter than air,” he says. “The bass is not large, so you’re not weighed down or grounded. You’re body is moving upward and I think this design came out because at the time people were coming out of the depression. They needed an upper because the depression was a real downer.”

ASU Public Events’ is hosting pre-party experience program at 6 p.m., Sept. 25, to heighten the theatre experience for performing arts patrons by providing an exploration of the history surrounding the events chronicled in “Zoot Suit.”

Valdez says audience members can expect to be fully entertained by “Zoot Suit.”

“You’ll see how the show gives off a strong vibration. There’s humor and there is documentation of the event,” Valdez says. “There’s hope, there’s joy and a sense of rival. They (audience members) should be infused with a sense of magic with the ability to take any negative and change it into a positive. People tend to strut when they walk out.”

Tickets are $30 and can be purchased by calling ASU’s Gammage box office at (480) 965-3434 and all Ticketmaster outlets and ticketmaster.com. Students and groups of 10 receive 50% off by calling (480) 965-6678. For more information visit asugammage.com or elteatrocampesino.com.

By Manny Romero
Romero, with Media Relations & Public Information, can be reached at (480) 727-3116 or (mlromero@asu.edu).