San Antonio

Robert Anthony Rodríguez is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer, editor and musician. He shoots and produces... many of his films in his native Texas and Mexico. He has directed such films as Desperado, From Dusk till Dawn, The Faculty, Spy Kids, Sin City, Planet Terror, and Machete. He is a friend and frequent collaborator of filmmaker Quentin Tarantino. Rodríguez was born in San Antonio, Texas, the son of Mexican-American parents Rebecca , a nurse, and Cecilio G. Rodríguez, a salesman. He began his interest in film at age 11 when his father bought one of the first VCRs, which came with a camera. While attending St. Anthony High School, he was commissioned to videotape the school's football games. According to his sister he was fired soon after for shooting them with a cinematic style, getting shots of parents' reactions and the ball traveling through the air instead of shooting the whole play. There he met Carlos Gallardo; they both shot films on video throughout high school and college.
more

Joan Crawford , born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre. Starting as a dancer in traveling theatrical... companies before debuting on Broadway, Crawford was signed to a motion picture contract by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1925. Initially frustrated by the size and quality of her parts, Crawford began a campaign of self-publicity and became nationally known as a flapper by the end of the 1920s. In the 1930s, Crawford's fame rivaled MGM colleagues Norma Shearer and Greta Garbo. Crawford often played hardworking young women who find romance and financial success. These "rags-to-riches" stories were well-received by Depression-era audiences and were popular with women. Crawford became one of Hollywood's most prominent movie stars and one of the highest paid women in the United States, but her films began losing money and by the end of the 1930s she was labeled "box office poison". After an absence of nearly two years from the screen, Crawford staged a comeback by starring in Mildred Pierce , for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress.
more

Carol Creighton Burnett is an American actress, comedian, singer, dancer and writer. Burnett started her career in New York. After becoming a hit on... Broadway, she made her television debut. After successful appearances on The Garry Moore Show, Carol moved to Los Angeles and began an eleven-year run on The Carol Burnett Show which was aired on CBS television from 1967 to 1978. With roots in vaudeville, The Carol Burnett Show was a variety show which combined comedy sketches, song, and dance. The comedy sketches included film parodies and character pieces. Burnett created many characters during the show's television run. Burnett was born in San Antonio, Texas, the daughter of Ina Louise , a publicity writer for movie studios, and Joseph Thomas Burnett, a movie theater manager. Both of her parents suffered from alcoholism, and at a young age she was left with her grandmother, Mabel Eudora White. Her parents divorced in the late 1930s, and Burnett and her grandmother moved to an apartment near her mother’s in an impoverished area of Hollywood. There, they stayed in a boarding house with her younger half-sister Chrissy.
more

Louis Whitley Strieber is an American writer best known for his horror novels The Wolfen and The Hunger and for Communion, a non-fiction account of... his perceived experiences with non-human entities. Strieber also co-authored The Coming Global Superstorm with Art Bell, which inspired the film about sudden climate change, The Day After Tomorrow. He has persisted as a supporter of alternative concept advocates through the Unknown Country website. Strieber was born in San Antonio, Texas, the son of Karl Strieber, a lawyer and Mary Drought Strieber. He attended Central Catholic Marianist High School in San Antonio, Texas. He was educated at the University of Texas at Austin and the London School of Film Technique, graduating from each in 1968. He then worked for several advertising firms in New York City, rising to the level of vice president before quitting in 1977. Strieber began his career as a novelist with the horror novels The Wolfen and The Hunger , each of which was later made into a movie, followed by the less successful horror novels Black Magic and The Night Church . Strieber then turned to speculative fiction.
more

Christopher Gilbert "Chris" Pérez is a American guitarist and the widower of "The Queen of Tejano music" Selena. He is currently a guitarist... for A.B. Quintanilla III y Los Kumbia All Starz since he joined in 2006. Prior to that, Pérez was the lead guitarist for his wife's band Selena y Los Dinos from 1989 to 1995 and A.B. Quintanilla III y Los Kumbia Kings from 2003 to 2006. Pérez met Selena in 1988. The Quintanilla family hired him to play in Selena's band and the pair fell in love. At first, Abraham Quintanilla Jr., Selena's father and manager, did not approve of their relationship. Eventually, Selena's father fired Pérez from the band. He rejoined Selena y Los Dinos after he and Selena were married on April 2, 1992 in Nueces County, Texas, when she was 20. On March 31, 1995, Selena was shot and killed by Yolanda Saldivar, leaving Chris as a widower. At the 2000 Grammy Awards his eponymously titled group, Chris Pérez Band, won a Grammy Award for Best Latin Rock/Alternative Album for their album Resurrection. In this album Pérez dedicated the song, "Best I Can", to his wife, Selena. In 2002, Chris Pérez Band made their final album called Una Noche Más.
more

Leticia Hinojosa is a folksinger recording in both Spanish and English. Hinojosa was the youngest of 13 children. Hinojosa's parents were Mexican... immigrants. Hinojosa has charted twice on the Billboard country charts and has recorded several albums, primarily for Rounder Records. Her 1992 album Culture Swing won the NAIRD Indie Folk Album of the Year.
more