Rita Moreno (Actor)

"I am Latin and know what it is to feel alone because you are different. When you are ignored, you lose your sense of identity. So I can be the Latin on television in 'The Electric Company', and my presence can tell a lot of children and some adults, 'We do exist, we have value.'" --Moreno quoted in InTheater, November 8, 1999.

About acting on stage: "I always get nervous ... What I love is the immediacy of a live performance. In concerts, of course, I can be much looser, because it can go almost any way I want. But there is something absolutely fabulous about interacting with wonderful actors on stage, and it all comes back so fast, it's amazing: 'Oh, that's what I have to do. I have to find my light.' You can't drop the ends of sentences in an ensemble piece." --Rita Moreno quoted in TheaterWeek December 25-31, 1995.

About the perils of her career, Moreno told Jan Breslauer in Los Angeles Times (November 21, 1996): "Now, not only being Hispanic but older really compounds the problems. Yes, I've had to spend a good deal of my life putting up with the whole business of the stereotype."

Although the name Rosita Moreno appears in the credits for the films "The Scoundrel" (1935) and "A Medal For Benny" (1945) and some sources attribute these films to her, it is not Rita Moreno but another actress, Rosita Moreno, who appeared in Hollywood films from the 1930s on. Rita Moreno made her film debut in 1950 in "So Young, So Bad" (1950) as Rosita Moreno. She changed her name to Rita Moreno for her second film, "Toast of New Orleans" (1950).

Moreno remains tightlipped about her relationship with Marlon Brando, the breakup of which led to a 1961 suicide attempt. As she told People (September 12, 1998): "I don't talk about him. We went together for [almost] 10 years. That's as much as I say."

Moreno was one of 32 private citizens named by President Bill Clinton to serve on the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities