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Cine '98: The San Diego-Baja California Latino Film Festival pays tribute to Moctesuma Esparza, an award winning producer, acclaimed for his many important projects throughout the history of Latino filmmaking in the United States. Among the feature films Esparza has helmed are "The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez", "Milagro Beanfield War" and "Selena."
Mr. Esparza was a key figure in the organization of the historic Los Angeles high school walkouts, which occurred on March 3,1968, when twenty thousand Chicano students protested educational injustice by walking out of class. This resulted in a highly visible and effective means of peaceful resistance. He has since dedicated his career to providing access and opportunities for Latinos in Hollywood.
Victor Payan: Tell me a little about your background, and how you came to be involved in the L.A. high school walkouts in 1968.
Moctesuma Esparza: I'm a first generation Chicano and my dad came here to the United States in 1918, basically out of the mass migration of Mexicanos coming out of the Mexican Revolution. I grew up with a very strong sense of social justice and the reasons for the Revolution, along with a history of the United States and of Mexico. My father experienced the occupation of Veracruz by U.S. Marines, which caused a lot of hunger and dislocation in Mexico, during the period that Pershing was invading Mexico. So that was a background to my social formation. As I was going to school here in the United States, the contradictions of what I learned at school and what I learned at home, created a tremendous tension in my life. I was blessed with a father who engaged me in political conversations, and because of my father's acute political education and understanding of historical forces, I was cognizant very early of the contradictions that existed in this country. At the same time I was an admirer of the Bill of Rights and what this country's Constitution represented. So it created a tremendous conflict in me, and I grew to be an angry person- a very angry young man, angry at the injustices that existed for our people here in this country.
Victor Payan: And I'm sure you saw this anger brewing in your peers.
Moctesuma Esparza: There was a very small group of people who organized the walkouts and created the Chicano Civil Rights Movement. But we ignited a firestorm that was ready. That anger was below the surface of thousands and thousands of students.
Victor Payan: What were some injustices you remember from going to school in the late Sixties as a young Chicano.
Moctesuma Esparza: The contradictions, hypocrisies and lies of the history of the nation provoked a certain anger, I guess is the best word, because of the obvious social injustice that we were living in the country as Chicanos and Mexicanos....that we were all being programmed to be laborers, and none of us were being programmed to go to college. There was a realization that the drop-out rate was not our own failure, but that of the system which preprogrammed us. The failure on our part was that we bought into it, and we accepted that was all we could do.
Victor Payan: At this time, there were student conferences being organized to address these issues in which you played a role.
Moctesuma Esparza: Our goals at that point were to change the schools, to reform them so they were no longer pushing out our classmates, and would focus on providing us with an equal education and a true history of our contributions to the country. That led first to aneffort of communicating with the school districts, which proved futile. They just sort of patted us on the head and told us to go on our way. So we needed to take a radical step and we decided, a very small group of us, to organize the walkouts of March 1968, which were in the planning stage for about a year. Those walkouts resulted in 20,000 students going out on strike for a week in Los Angeles, which then had echoes in the Southwest and throughout the United States. The outgrowth of that, of course, was repressive reaction from the school authorities and the government. Thirteen of us were indicted. I was one of the ones indicted and I faced forty-five years to life in jail, on charges of conspiracy to commit a misdemeanor, which is a felony.
Victor Payan: And at what age were you at this time?
Moctesuma Esparza: I was eighteen years old. If they'd have just charged us with a misdemeanor, it would have been like a thirty day deal, but making it a conspiracy turned it into a felony.
Victor Payan: So by this time you knew the issue was not the fact that you had walked out. There was something bigger at stake.
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, yes, of course, and my role in the actual walkouts was as a liaison to the press.
Victor Payan: Given the state of paranoia the country was in during this period, how were issues like the walkouts, the death of Rubén Salazar, and Oscar Acosta's run for Sheriff viewed by the press?
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, of course, that we were unAmerican, that we were outside agitators in our own community, that we were ungrateful, and that "they" were doing the best they could for a population that really didn't have (what it took) to succeed. My role (as) a liaison to the press was to call press conferences, organize them and give interviews. That led me to become much more involved in media.
Victor Payan: What was your career goal at the time?
Moctesuma Esparza: My career goal at the time was to become an organizer, a community organizer, a political activist.
Victor Payan: But at the same time, I think you kind of are, in a different setting...you're organizing films.
Moctesuma Esparza: Yes. Well, that's what I later realized. While I was in college, I (was asked) to organize a conference on the role of media in the lives of minority communities. So we organized this committee recommendations was that there should be minorities in film school, third world people in film school. Around that time I was having some difficulty in the History department. I was a History major and had taken a class in California history, and not cited the assigned reading text. The professor was the author of the text and I cited instead, North from Mexico, Carey McWilliams and Leonard Pitt, Decline of the Californios, which were not on the approved reading list. He gave me an incomplete and told me I had no future in the History department. So, since I had created this program over in the film school, and the professor and other students wanted me in the program, I made a decision that it was an expedient way to get my degree. I went over to the film school with really no intentions of being involved in the film industry.
Once I was there, however, I was convinced that what I could do in the film industry was to be a producer, because what I did in life was organize and that's what producers do. While I was a student, I organized the filming of a speech by Reyes Lopez Tijerina at UCLA. I had organized a symposium where he, "Corky" Gonzalez and other people, Luis Valdez and Dolores Huerta, were brought in; and then I organized a student cooperative to film the Moratorium March of August 29th, 1970. That of course, became a police riot in which Rubén Salazar was killed, and that became my first documentary which I produced,"Requiem 29."
Victor Payan: It must have been a very exciting period.
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, it was truly a gift in many ways because it allowed us something to struggle against, and when you struggle against something, you grow. You define who you are and you know who you are, and you know what your goals in life are. The life of luxury, of comfort, although certainly very attractive, does not generally provide one a context for struggle or for growth. I do believe that today we have many parallels to thirty years ago with the xenophobia surrounding (propositions) 187 and 209 here in California, and the anti-immigrant bashing that goes on all the time. There is a new generation of first generation Chicanos and Latinos here in the country, who are experiencing pretty much the same sort of things we did thirty years ago, and that our parents and grandparents experienced before us.
Victor Payan: And that includes struggling against an industry which demeans us and keeps us invisible.
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, the choice I made, the decision I made when I finally did decide this was going to be my career, that I would be a producer, was choosing to take on the role to transform our image, not just in the United States, but in the world; to transform an image Hollywood had created which was stereotypical and demeaning, to an image of us as a people, as human beings of this land, who have something special to offer this country and the world, along with the rest of the native people of this continent.
Victor Payan:: After UCLA, you worked on "Sesame Street."
Moctesuma Esparza: Yes, I was very fortunate. "Sesame Street" was looking to include some bilingual segments in their programming, and I was asked to be a consultant to help design that. I ended up making some short films for them and that led to my having some background and experience in early childhood education and bilingual education. Upon my graduation from film school, I was fortunate to become the producer for the very first pilot and season of "Villa Alegre." I did the first season which set the pace and the tone for what it was going to be. The series was nominated and won many many awards, including the Peabody. I went on my way as an independent film producer, producing documentaries for the next ten years, almost.
Victor Payan: And you produced a documentary which was nominated or an Academy Award.
Moctesuma Esparza: Yes, and I knew that if I was going to get into the feature film business, I was going to (have to) penetrate Hollywood. Since I had no role model, and there was no such thing as a "Chicano producer" in Hollywood, I would have to establish a track record of quality. Since the field I was able to get into was children's programming and later documentaries, I knew that these had to be of a standard and quality that would win awards.
Victor Payan: You then produced a feature film called "Only Once in a Lifetime," which you have said taught you a valuable lesson about the business of producing films.
Moctesuma Esparza: I learned a great deal about understanding that a movie has to be made for a market, and that film is truly the marriage of art and commerce. There has to be a recognition and a nod to both sides in order to succeed, to have people see your film and to have any kind of impact on consciousness. So for the next film, I chose to make a movie with a genre that could support that, and I chose to make a western, which was "The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez." It took me three, four years to recover from the first film to be able to do it.
Victor Payan: And that was funded by, or was it picked up by American Playhouse?
Moctesuma Esparza: It was picked up by American Playhouse. I sold it to German television. I got a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the sale to American Playhouse.
Victor Payan: And, uh, it was your work with PBS earlier where you learned the model and language for writing a grant for a project, that could get funded by the NEH or the NEA.
Moctesuma Esparza: Yes, one of the things I learned early in life is that in order to establish rapport or communication with any segment of life, you have to understand the language. You have to understand how people hear and how they listen, and what particular vocabulary exists in that world. That for me has been in essence, one of the keys to progress in my career, and in the work that I've done.....I've been very careful to learn the language of commerce, the language of studios, and the language of PBS.
Victor Payan: Right, which doesn't necessarily change your vision but just provides a bridge.
Moctesuma Esparza: That's correct, so I'm able to communicate what it is that I care about and am interested in, in a way that they'll hear me. I mean as an example, the protest movement was the only language that could succeed when we started, because we wouldn't be heard no matter what. But, this is a different time and a different circumstance, so different tools are required. And at the same time, the protest movements existing today, exist in a particular situation where that's the only thing that'll get heard. So it's a question of understanding what's appropriate to each moment.
Victor Payan: And speaking those multiple vocabularies, because in Hollywood, the pitch is everything. If you can't get past that hurdle, there's nothing.
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, in that moment in time when "Gregorio Cortez" was made, I took a completely different path. I didn't even go to Hollywood. I went to the National Council de la Raza which was an organization that would obviously hear the importance of creating positive images of us. I went to enlist them in a partnership to develop a series of films, and they went to the Endowment of the Humanities and got a grant so that I could go out and acquire properties. We picked five properties and actually got to make two of them, "With a Pistol in His Hand" by Americo Paredes which became "Gregorio Cortez", and "The Milagro Beanfield War."
Victor Payan: So, from that it took a few years to get "The Milagro Beanfield War" done?
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, I acquired for "The Milagro Beanfield War" in '79. "Gregorio Cortez" was done in '81 and "Milagro Beanfield War" went into production in '86. It did take a while. And that was the function of getting to a screenplay that (director) Robert Redford and I and the studio were all happy with. I made a decision that he was an incredibly talented filmmaker who had a feeling for this material, who had heart for it, and so I made a decision to stay with him. I'm very, very pleased with the movie.
Victor Payan: The whole issue as a producer, I think, is bringing the right people together at the right time for the right project.
Moctesuma Esparza: Absolutely!
Victor Payan: And I think what emerges with "Beanfield" is a solid piece of work and that's what's important in the end. And it was a major departure from your work in public television.
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, yes. I've done three important projects that were with PBS. I did "Villa Alegre," I did "The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez", and then I did Culture Clash's "Bowl of Beings" for Great Performances, but I've always focused primarily on a commercial world, a non-PBS world. I've found that, for me in any case, it was easier to work in the commercial world than the PBS world, because the decisions were reached much more quickly. The motivations and behavior patterns, in many cases, were more direct and on the surface. If one could figure out what it was that people wanted to buy and what their motivations were, it was a lot easier to achieve one's goals of getting something funded, although I think funded is probably an inappropriate word in the commercials...sold, get it sold.
Victor Payan: Were the '80s, the so-called "Decade of the Hispanic", a good decade for Latino film in your opinion?
Moctesuma Esparza: The '80s were a time in which Luis Valdez wrote and directed "La Bamba," I did "The Milagro Beanfield War," Cheech Marin did "Born in East L.A.," and Edward James Olmos did "Stand and Deliver" with Ramón Melendez. Those were important films that came out very close together, and they had a certain promise of change in the marketplace. There was economic success for those films. "La Bamba" was the highest grossing Latino film and has yet to be surpassed. Not even "A Walk in the Clouds" has grossed more. "La Bamba" is still the number one highest grossing Latino-oriented feature film, and "Born in East L.A." was very profitable for the price it was made. A little earlier in the decade, I guess it was about '84, you had "El Norte" which again was profitable. But what happened was all these filmmakers did not get a second opportunity, right away.
Victor Payan: Many Latino filmmakers said of the '80s that it seemed for a while doors were opening, but as quickly as they opened, they closed.
Moctesuma Esparza: Yeah, it was very peculiar. I'm still not quite clear why it happened the way it did. However, I don't believe that is true this time. A couple of films have been made within the last few years, and each one of these films has been very successful. From "Fools Rush In" at one end, to "Mi Familia" and "Selena" at the other, and "Desperado" somewhere in the middle, all were economically successful, all had a Latino family or story at the core, and all of those filmmakers are moving forward with their careers in important ways. There's a whole new group of filmmakers coming up who are a new generation, and I believe they're going to multiply very quickly. We will no longer have a situation where there's only one, two or three Chicano filmmakers that I, as a producer, could go talk to. I think very soon there's going to be a dozen, just like the growth pattern that occurred with African-American filmmakers. Today there's anywhere from ten to twenty feature films made every year, focusing on that community's life experience or creative interest. I believe within a few years it's going to be true in our community as well.
Victor Payan: Now we're in the decade since the "Decade of the Hispanic" at the end of the '90s. What do you think we have gained?
Moctesuma Esparza: There is an undeniable acceptance in Hollywood that there is a market for Latino-themed films. Not every film is going to succeed. There are still demands which have to be met by any filmmaker in order to get the kinds of budgetary support to make a movie. Even a modest movie costs millions of dollars. But the studios can no longer say there isn't a market. "Selena," I think, finally finished that argument. And there is now a real opening.
Victor Payan: Tell me about the experience of going from a film like "Gregorio Cortez", to producing a film of a larger scope like "Gettysburg".
Moctesuma Esparza: They have a great deal in common actually. "Gregorio Cortez" was a story that focused on cultural misunderstanding, language misunderstanding, racism and prejudice, which colored people's ideas as to who people were. "Gettysburg" is, in my opinion, a movie that looks again at people who misunderstand each other, in terms of their own
Victor Payan: How was "Gettysburg" received?
Moctesuma Esparza: Well, it's the highest rated cable movie in cable history. I've got the number one film. And I've got the number two film, "Rough Riders." That's the second highest rated basic cable movie of all time.
Victor Payan: The first day of the film festival is March 3, the 30th anniversary of the walkouts. In the thirty years since then, if you can look back on your career and say, "This is what I've accomplished," what's your proudest accomplishment?
Moctesuma Esparza: I feel very fortunate. I have achieved a significant number of my goals in life, and I'm now having to invent new goals; and I'm doing that. It is a time of acceleration: acceleration in technology, acceleration in politics, world politics and the acceleration socially, to think that in one generation we could bust down the barriers of access to education, politics, economics and market power, and participate in a completely different way within one generation. From an historical point of view, it is quite amazing. Certainly thirty years ago we all thought thirty years would be far too long to achieve anything. We wanted to do things immediately and thank God for that kind of energy, the naivet that youth gives one. At the same time, I feel extraordinary achievements have been made by my generation in thirty years, because it is now truly possible for people to achieve their dreams and for them not to feel like pipe dreams. People can actually have dreams, apply themselves and achieve them. I certainly have done that in my own life and I now see it as a reality, not for just exceptions, but for the depth and breadth of our community.
This article was originally published in the 1998 festival program of the San Diego Latino Film Festival.
We gratefully thank Grace van Thillo for transcribing and editing this interview.
For more information regarding these articles and/or to submit an article yourself,
please contact Ethan van Thillo at sdlff@sdlatinofilm.com
San Diego Latino Film Festival,
c/o Media Arts Center San Diego,
2039 29th Street,
San Diego, CA 92104
TEL: 619.230.1938, FAX: 619.234.9722,
sdlff@sdlatinofilm.com, www.sdlatinofilm.com
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