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The first test, I think, was learning English in kindergarten when I didn’t know a word, not a word. And you know what? I have a feeling that a lot of people who are outliers have strong constitutions because it’s either sink or swim, right? And I think you learn early on in life that swimming is preferable to sinking. I really credit that for helping me through some really, really bad times.
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Maybe it’s due to learning how to cope with my tumultuous life through psychotherapy.
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What struck me most watching the film is that despite going through what would defeat or embitter most, you seem to have emerged with such joy and appreciation for life. Remarks have been edited for clarity and brevity. “And I demand costumes,” the screen legend says with a smile.Īs upbeat as Moreno remains, “Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It” also deals frankly with the many turbulences of Moreno’s life: being positioned as the “Spanish Elizabeth Taylor” and the stereotyped casting that followed a long and painful relationship with Marlon Brando the abuse of her agent a confining marriage. The film opens with Moreno preparing a Cuban-themed party for her 87th birthday. The reason for the conversation was Mariem Pérez Riera’s intimate and invigorating documentary. “I have never given up,” she said in a recent interview by Zoom from her home in Berkeley, Calif. That has made Moreno, who co-stars in Steven Spielberg’s upcoming “West Side Story” remake, a heroic figure to Latinos, and to others. In the decades that followed, Moreno has won a Tony, a Grammy, an Emmy and an Oscar, for “West Side Story.” (Her entire acceptance speech: “I don’t believe it.”) With seemingly infinite spiritedness, she has epitomized the best of show business while also being a victim to its cruelties. “I can’t think of anyone I’ve ever met in the business who lived the American dream more than Rita Moreno,” Norman Lear says in the documentary “Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It.” By 20, she was performing in “Singin’ in the Rain.” By 6, she was dancing at Greenwich Village nightclubs.
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NEW YORK - Rita Moreno emigrated with her mother from Puerto Rico at age 5.