[Congressional Record Volume 162, Number 170 (Tuesday, November 29, 2016)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1531]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      IN HONOR OF MR. LUIS VALDEZ

                                 ______
                                 

                             HON. SAM FARR

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, November 29, 2016

  Mr. FARR. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to join President Obama in 
honoring a truly great American, Mr. Luis Valdez of San Juan Bautista, 
California. This past September, Luis participated in a White House 
ceremony where the President presented him with a National Medal of the 
Arts in recognition of his lifetime of contributions to the arts of the 
Unites States. The recognition highlights the incredible contribution 
Luis has made as a playwright, actor, writer, and director.
   Luis Valdez was born in Delano, California, in 1940. He was the 
second of ten children and grew up in a family of migrant farm workers. 
Luis began work in the fields at a young age and followed the harvest 
with his family up and down California's Central Valley. He attended 
numerous schools before his family finally settled in San Jose. He 
entered San Jose State University on a scholarship for math and physics 
but switched his major to English and began to pursue his passion for 
theater. The imagination of theater had held a grip on Luis from an 
early age. In grammar school, he had organized plays and put on puppet 
shows in his garage. While still at SJSU, Luis won a playwriting 
contest with The Theft, and produced a full length play called The 
Shrunken Head of Pancho Villa.
   In 1965, Luis returned to Delano and joined with Cesar Chavez in the 
UFW's effort to organize farmworkers. It was then that he had the 
inspiration to combine his passions for theater and social justice and 
created a farm workers theater troupe simply called El Teatro 
Campesino. The group specialized in short one act plays based on the 
farm worker experience that aimed to educate both farmworkers and the 
broader public. By 1967, El Teatro began to explore broader Chicano 
themes and Luis left the group to share that vision with a broader 
audience. He founded the Centro Campesino Cultural in Del Rey and later 
Fresno to produce plays in a theater setting.
   Luis quickly developed a reputation as the Godfather of Chicano 
theater and helped organize other Chicano theater groups throughout the 
Southwest. During this period he wrote and produced numerous plays, 
including La Virgen de Tepeyac, La carpa de los resquachis, and 
Corridos: Tales of Passion and Revolucion. However, Luis is best known 
for his seminal play Zoot Suit which he first produced in Los Angeles 
in 1978. The next year, Zoot Suit became the first play written by a 
Chicano produced on Broadway. A film version followed in 1981. This 
film experience led Luis to other television and movie projects, 
including the hit movie La Bamba in 1987 that told the story of Richie 
Valens.
   All along Luis remained committed to the campesino movement that he 
helped form and that helped to form him. In 1971, he moved his theater 
group to San Juan Bautisa in my California district. He became a 
founding member of the California Arts Council and is a member of the 
College of Fellows of the American Theater.
   Mr. Speaker, I know I speak for the whole House when I extend our 
congratulations to Luis Valdez for his most recent of honors. It comes 
on top of a lifetime of achievement giving voice to those voices that 
have been so often missed or dismissed by our broader society. Mindful 
of recent events, his voice is more important than ever.

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