Tag Archives: The Ritz

Rita Moreno to Star in the Feature Film “The Prank”

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Rita Moreno is pranking around…

The 89-year-old Puerto Rican actress, singer and dancer, an EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar & Tony Award winner) has landed a starring role in the feature film The Prank, which will be directed by Maureen Bharoocha.

Rita Moreno

Moreno will star opposite Connor Kalopsis and Ramona Young.

The Prank follows two high school students who play a prank on their physics teacher, Mrs. Wheeler, played by Moreno. When she fails them on a test; they teach the imperious, demanding, insulting instructor a lesson by falsely accusing her of the murder of a missing student.

Other cast in The Prank includes Keith David, Meredith Salenger, Jonathan Kimmel, Nathan Janak and Kate Flannery.

Filming begins this month in and around Los Angeles.

The dark comedy is written by Rebecca Flinn-White & Zak White.

“Rita Moreno is a force of nature and an icon who continues to redefine herself,” said Bharoocha. “Her brilliant comedic mind lends itself to the perfect ‘Mrs. Wheeler’, a character we have never seen her play, and one that will no doubt surprise audiences.”

Moreno has won an Oscar (West Side Story), a Tony (The Ritz), two Emmys (for her turns respectively in 1977 and 1978 on The Muppet Show and Rockford Files), and a Grammy (Best Children’s Album for The Electric Company).

Moreno has starred on Broadway and London’s West End, appeared in more than 40 feature films and has performed in numerous regional theaters, including her one-woman show, Life Without Makeup, at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. She recently co-starred in the critically acclaimed Latinx reimagining of Norman Lear’s classic sitcom One Day At A Time.

Her documentary, Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go For It, produced by Lear, Lin Manuel Miranda and Brent Miller had its world debut at the Sundance Film Festival this year. The film, which was met with acclaim from critics and audiences alike, will have its television debut on PBS’ American Masters nationwide on October 5.

Moreno also co-stars and is an executive producer of the Steven Spielberg remake of West Side Story, set to open on December 10.

The recipient of the Peabody Career Achievement Award and the Kennedy Center Honor for her lifetime contributions to American culture, she was also honored by her peers as the 50th recipient of the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award.

Moreno’s all-Spanish-language album, Una Vez Más, was produced by her good friend Emilio Estefan, and she is a New York Times bestselling author with her first book, Rita Moreno: A Memoir. Moreno has received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush and the National Medal of Arts from President Barack Obama.

Perez Joins the Cast of Larry David’s Broadway Play “Fish in the Dark”

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Rosie Perez is gone fishin’…

The 49-year-old Puerto Rican Oscar-nominated actress has joined the cast of Fish in the Dark, the new play written by and starring Larry David.

Rosie Perez

The comedy, which has lined up its Broadway dates and theater, revolves around a death in the family.

In addition to Perez, the ensemble cast will include Jayne Houdyshell and Jonny Orsini.

Nurse Jackie alum Jake Cannavale, Bobby Cannavale’s son, and veteran character actor Jerry Adler will also appear alongside David.

Fish in the Dark will be directed by Anna D. Shapiro.

Perez’s most recent Broadway outing was the 2007 production of Terrence McNally’s The Ritz.

Produced by Scott Rudin, Fish in the Dark swims into the Cort Theater for a run that begins previews February 2, prior to a March 5 opening. The Cort’s current occupant — This Is Our Youth starring Michael Cera, Kieran Culkin and Tavi Gevinson — also is produced by Rudin and helmed by Shapiro, in a run currently set to end in January.

Moreno Receives Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2014 SAG Awards

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Life’s a SAG for living legend Rita Moreno…

The 82-year-old Puerto Rican actress/singer/dancer, a Grammy, Oscar, Golden Globe and Tony Award winner, was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 20th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards on Saturday night.

Rita Moreno

Moreno accepted the special prize from Morgan Freeman, who called the West Side Story star his “dear old friend,” as well as a “world-class actress, singer, dancer and fighter who battled to break through the racial and sexual barriers that plagued Hollywood‘s Golden Age.”

Moreno did a victory lap onstage after receiving a standing ovation before saying that she was “f—ing thrilled,” but the audio had been was cut during the live broadcast when she dropped the F-bomb.

She later apologized for “that word” before saying, “Actually, I’m not.”

Alluding to her surprised acceptance speech for her Oscar, she said she still honestly can’t believe she’s received SAG’s honor.

Moreno, who briefly flirted with Jeremy Renner and Brad Pitt, also said she hoped she was receiving the Life Achievement Award “early in the third act of my life.” She finished by singing several lines from “This is All I Ask.”

A showbiz veteran and a SAG member for more than six decades, Moreno is one of only 11 people to have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony — a feat known as the EGOT.

She first appeared on the big screen in the reform-school drama So Young, So Bad in 1950, and afterward was put under contract as an ingenue at MGM, where a casting director changed her first name to Rita.

Moreno’s first film for the studio was the Mario Lanza musical The Toast of New Orleans, and she had a small role as the flapper actress Zelda Zanders in Singin’ in the Rain two years later.

She would go on to star in such films as The King and I, West Side Story — for which she won her Oscar in 1962 — and Carnal Knowledge.

Moreno won her Grammy for The Electric Company Album in 1972, her Tony for The Ritz in 1975, and her two Emmys for appearances on The Muppet Show and The Rockford Files in 1977 and 1978.

She continues to stay busy, having just finished a run as Fran Drescher’s mother in the TV Land comedy Happily Divorced.

She will appear next in the upcoming indie drama Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks with Gena Rowlands.