Moctesuma Esparza is widely regarded as the most successful
Latino independent film producer in Hollywood. Esparza has won
Emmy, Clio and Golden Globe awards, been Oscar-nominated, and has
produced such films as “Selena” and “Gods and
Generals.” A UCLA alumnus, Esparza has also been a historic
figure in the struggle for minority representation in the media
industry.
While an undergraduate in the early 1970s, Esparza organized the
Ethnocommunications Program, which allowed for increased minority
enrollment in the film school. The program produced a generation of
black, Asian American and Latino filmmakers.
Esparza will be on campus this week as a visiting Regents’
Lecturer, and will be speaking Tuesday and Thursday evening at the
James Bridges Theater at Melnitz Hall about his movies and the
changing roles of minorities in film and television.
“It’s because of him that I have a job,” said
Chon Noriega, director of the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center.
“Back in the 1970s he really defined the issues for why it
was important for Chicano film makers to have access to the film
and television industry.”
In his films “Selena” and “The Disappearance
of Garcia Lorca,” both of which will be shown on campus this
week, Esparza brought the stories of important Latino artists into
mainstream America.
Most recently, he has been working on the lighthearted comedy,
“The Wedding,” about a Latino family nuptial where
everything goes wrong. He’s also has two more serious
projects, both with HBO. The first of which is based on the 1968
Los Angeles civil-rights walkouts. His other is on the mass murders
of women happening in Juarez, Mexico.
“It’s an examination of the cultural issues and
callousness of the society that is allowing the continued murder of
young women who come to work at the maquiladores (U.S.-owned
factories) in Juarez,” said Esparza.
An ever-present advocate for increasing representation of
Latinos in film and television, Esparza believes that Latinos are
finally on the verge of gaining a fair share of the movie and
primetime television market. According to a recent study by the
UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center, Latin Americans make up 4
percent of the people on prime-time television despite being 13
percent of the total U.S. population.
“The average age of a native-born American Latino is 18
years old, while the average age of all Americans is 37,”
said Esparza. “And since the average age demographic of
moviegoers is 14 to 22 years old, Latinos actually comprise 30
percent of the total box office, and Hollywood is waking up to
this.”
A successful businessman himself, as the former CEO of
Buenavision Telecommunications and owner of his own chain of movie
theatres (Maya Theatres), Esparza believes Hollywood is going to
have to expand the roles of Latinos in light of its own economic
interest. According to Esparza, presently Latinos make up less than
3 percent of the people involved behind the camera, including
writers, producers and directors.
“The resistance to us is coming from the top down,”
said Esparza. “The people who are in the position to say yes
to a movie, who do the hiring: the producers, directors and writers
have resisted diversification.”
Despite this statistically obvious fact, Esparza does not blame
outright hateful racism for this resistance.
“Hollywood is a very nepotistic, insulated, incestuous
town,” said Esparza. “And it’s just human nature
for people to want to work with people, and tell the stories they
know and have grown up with.” Â
However, he believes enlightenment is needed to break the cycle
of minority exclusion from proper representation in the film and
television industry, even if it occurs solely out of economic
reasoning.
“It takes really courageous behavior to reach outside of
your group,” said Esparza. “Ultimately though, because
of the continued pressure from the new huge wave of Latino talent,
such as Jennifer Lopez and Salma Hayek, Hollywood will have to
protect itself and include us.”
For more info, go to www.cinema.ucla.edu or call (310)
206-FILM.