Rosa Delores Alverio, lovingly called Rosita, was born Fri., Dec. 11, 1931, in Humacao, Puerto Rico, to parents Francisco Jose Alverio and Rosa Maria (nee Marcano). Francisco was a farmer, and Rosa was a seamstress. In 1936, Francisco and Rosa divorced, and Rosa and Rosita left Puerto Rico to start a life for themselves in Harlem, a district in New York City. It was there that Rosita’s mom met and married Edward Moreno.
While in New York, Rosita started dance classes and quickly excelled. Her gift of dancing became a building block for her future ventures. She got her first “break” at age 11 when she met Louis B. Mayer, a cofounder of MGM studios. She hired her to do Spanish voice-overs for American movies that were sold in Spanish-speaking countries. Mayer called her the “Spanish Elizabeth Taylor.” She voice-dubbed many popular American movies such as National Velvet, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Meet Me in St. Louis and many others.
Rosita made her Broadway debut in Skydrift as Angelina in 1945 at just 13-years-old. It was this role that got her the attention of Hollywood talent scouts. Her role in Skydrift helped to launch her Broadway acting career. Eventually, Rosita shortened her name to Rita after famous actress Rita Hayworth and took her stepfathers last name giving us the name we all know her by today, Rita Moreno.
Moreno left the Broadway stage and began auditioning for movies. Performing the role of Zelda Zanders in Singin in the Rain and Tina in The Toast of New Orleans, it was during this time that she met Marlon Brando. They were in a relationship together for eight years. In 1954, Moreno posed for Life Magazine. The caption read “An Actress Catalog of Sex and Innocence.” Ms. Moreno began to feel very typecast, noting her roles were very typical of a young Hispanic female. One exception to this was her role of Tuptim in the film version of The King and I. In 1961, Rita starred as Anita in Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim’s “West side Story.” She received an Oscar for this role in 1962 – the first Hispanic female to ever receive this award!
Moreno returned to the stage in 1964 and starred in The Sun in 1968. She was also in the cast of Summer and Smoke.
Morneo married Leonard Gordon, a cardiologist and her manager, in 1965. They remained a couple until Gordon’s death in 2010.
She is said to have done it all – cabarets, arts, television, theater and radio. In 1975 she was awarded the a Tony for her role in The Ritz. She is the third person to complete the EGOT, which is someone who has received an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony award. A woman of many talents, in 1995 she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Showcasing her multifaceted career that has spanned over seven decades, at eighty-one, she published her autobiography, Rita Moreno: A Memoir. The year 2015 proved to be a busy year for Rita, she was the Grand Marshall for the National Puerto Rican day parade and released an all-Spanish album Luna Vez Mas produced by Emilio Estefan. Her philanthropic nature was expressed as she aided victims from Hurricane Maria in her homeland of Puerto Rico in 2017. She has had other honors bestowed upon her like the Presidential Medal of Freedom given to her by George W. Bush and the medal of Arts by Barack Obama.
In 2019 Rita was the Peabody award recipient. Only two others have received this prestigious award. The Peabody award is the oldest major electronic media award in the United States. Peabody executive director Jeffrey P. Jones said of Rita “She is a pioneering Latina in Hollywood who has broken many barriers.”
At the young age of eighty-nine she returned to television as the abuela in the sitcom One Day at a Time and is looking forward to her role in Steven Spielberg’s remake of West Side Story.
As a Hispanic woman in the entertainment industry, Rita endured and overcame many hardships during her rise to fame, including racial discrimination, having a predator for an agent, and suffering from an underground abortion while in her relationship with Brando. Going through all this helped to shape her into the person she is today. She states her secret to life is being perseverant. Yes, Rita has preserved.
SOURCES:
https://www.playbill.com/person/rita-moreno-vault-0000107734
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/celebrity/rita_moreno
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