It’s tough to grasp when Puerto Rican theater truly began – however, when it comes to Broadway, we can look no further than some of the most renown figures in our culture’s theatrical history: Diosa Costello and José Ferrer, two of the first Puerto Ricans to take a step onto the Broadway stage during the 1930s. Costello is widely known as the first Puerto Rican woman ever to grace the stage in the 1939 production Too Many Girls. Nicknamed “The Latina Bombshell,” Costello continued to work in the Broadway scene while Ferrer worked on getting a Tony award in 1947 for his work in the musical Cyrano de Bergerac. Ferrer then became both the first Puerto Rican and Hispanic to win an Academy Award for his work in the film adaption of the same musical. Ferrer’s career, as well as the career of several other lesser-known Puerto Rican actors, then became impacted when he was soon found suspicious of being a communist.
The popularity of the hit musical West Side Story, a theater production with plenty of Puerto Rican characters, gave rise to a handful of actresses, including Chita Rivera and Josie de Guzman. The former played the role of Anita in the original run of the production in 1957, while the latter went on to play the role of Maria in the 1980 revival. Guzman’s performance of Maria left her with a Tony nomination – while Rivera finished her Broadway career with two Tony awards for her performances in The Rink and Kiss of the Spider Woman.
The 1960s was a successful time for Puerto Ricans on the Broadway scene. A woman by the name of Miriam Colon, an actress who found success on both the Broadway stage and on film, founded the Puerto Rican Travelling Theater – created as a means for Puerto Ricans to express themselves. Another successful Puerto Rican actor, Raúl Juliá, managed to find a start to his career through the PRTT. After getting nominated for Tony awards for Broadway productions such as Where’s Charley?, The Threepenny Opera, and Nine, Juliá went on to find himself having a productive time on film, receiving Golden Globe nominations for his roles in The Tempest and Kiss of the Spider Woman.
Puerto Rico-born Edith Diaz co-founded the Screen Actors Guild’s Ethnic Minorities Committee in 1972 as a means to advocate for Latino actors. Diaz was able to make this happen with fellow-Puerto Rican Henry Darrow, who had roles in Zorro and found the Nosotros organization as a means to advocate against Hispanic stereotyping. Other successful Puerto Rican actors during this time include Nicholas Dante for his work in A Chorus Line, Héctor Elizondo for his work in The Great White Bath and Steambath, and actor Miguel Piñero who co-founded the Nuyorican Poets Cafe.
Fast forward to the 2000s, where we have Puerto Ricans all around the Broadway and acting scene. Two of some of the most famous Puerto Ricans to work at this time include David Zayas, an actor notable for roles in hit television shows such as Dexter, in which he appeared in all of its eight seasons, and in Gotham, a television prequel to the events of the DC Comics character Batman. The other Puerto Rican is Lin-Manuel Miranda, an actor who starred and created the hit Broadway smashes In the Heights and Hamilton. Miranda’s Hamilton broke the record for most Tony nominations in 2016 – receiving 16 nominations and winning 11 of them. His work has landed him with a Pulitzer Prize, two Grammys, an Emmy, a MacArthur award, and three Tony awards. His work also led to him having created the soundtrack for Moana, a Disney film, as well as contributing to the soundtrack for Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Source:
http://www.nuyorican.org/history-and-awards/
https://www.ibdb.com/