Today we’d like to introduce you to Luzma Ortiz.
Hi Luzma, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
My father is a world renowned South American harp soloist and composer, (Alfredo Rolando Ortiz,) so I grew up going to concerts and music festivals my entire childhood. I remember watching the hilarious Christopher Guest film A Mighty Wind and thinking “Oh my God! That was my life!” and then laughing hysterically about it in the middle of the movie theatre. As a kid, I took harp lessons from my dad, tried the flute in elementary school and took private piano lessons. My sister was able to pick up the violin very well, even joining the Orange County Youth Symphony Orchestra at one point. Though I can still play piano at a basic level to this day, and I can quickly pick up an instrument for a role if needed, playing an instrument was not my true calling.
As a kid I thought my true calling was to be a veterinarian. But, like most people, I eventually realized that wanting to be a veterinarian was just a standard human childhood rite of passage. But it was in Junior High School that I decided singing was my true calling. I took choir as an elective and fell in love. I sang in choir for a total of ten years in 8 different choir groups from Jr. High School all the way through four years of community college. (Yes, four). But it was through the choir community in high school that I originally discovered the theatre community.
I remember my choir friends were obsessed with Rent, Into The Woods and Miss Saigon. So of course, I started listening to those soundtracks too and eventually I became obsessed as well. I auditioned for the high school plays like they did, so I could keep up with the trend in my circle of friends, and I got cast in a “split role” in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, sang “It’s Raining On Prom Night” with Sandy in their production of Grease, played Aunt Eller in a summer production of Oklahoma, Rosie in Bye Bye Birdie, and Squealer in a student play adaptation of Animal Farm for which I won “Best Actress”. Fun fact: The student who wrote and directed the Animal Farm play was Sean Cawelti, the Puppet Designer for the 2019, award winning, Pasadena Playhouse production of The Little Shop of Horrors. Crazy right? Anyway, I really loved performing in the theatre productions. But as my theatre loving friends all went on to different colleges, I leaned back into the comfort of the choir community that I knew and loved. Because I didn’t really know anything about doing theatre in college. And because I thought singing was my true calling.
At Riverside Community College, I registered myself as a music major, took private voice lessons to work on my singing technique and thrived in my comfortable choir community where I even served as the student vice president of the vocal music department at one point. But when it came down to pursuing an actual degree, I was always a bit lost. I didn’t really have the drive for it. All I knew, at the time, was that I wanted to sing.
I remember one of my choir mates was part of the Performance Riverside production of The Coconuts musical that was happening at the theatre located on campus. They needed a few extra pit singers for the production and asked him to reach out to other choir members to see if we were interested. Well, I was immediately interested and I remember being backstage, longingly watching the chaos of the quick costume changes, the scenic changes, and the actors hustling on and off stage each night, and thinking, “I want to do what they’re doing!” I also remember telling my voice teacher, Patty Gee, that I didn’t want to “just sing arias.” I wanted to sing songs where I could become a different character.
Patty was the best teacher, and she understood the assignment. She knew what my true calling was before I did. She encouraged me to audition for shows at local theaters where some of her other students were performing. She even taught me how to put together a headshot and resume. That’s when I found San Bernardino Valley College, where I spent two amazing summers under the direction of the late Denise Dales Jacobs, playing Jan in Grease and Maria in West Side Story, for which I won an Inland Theatre League Award in 2001. Patty also guided me towards applying to various schools and programs that focused on Musical Theatre. I wanted to follow her to the University of Redlands where she also taught, and even though I was accepted, my parents could not afford the tuition. Eventually I auditioned and got accepted to the American Musical and Dramatic Academy, in New York, and I was able to convince my parents to let me go because, while tuition was still high, it was only a two-year program rather than four.
Before leaving for New York, I booked my very first paid acting job in the ensemble of The Scarlet Pimpernel at Performance Riverside where Steven Glaudini, who now runs the Moonlight Amphitheatre in Vista, CA, served as producer. It was directed by Grant Rosen and starred, then Broadway Veteran, Kim Huber, and now Broadway Veterans Ed Staudenmayer, and Eric Anderson. It was September of 2001.
I remember coming to rehearsal after 9/11 happened and we all sat in the theatre seats sharing in our grief and supporting one another. It was a time and experience in my life that I will truly never forget. I told my parents I would leave the decision of whether I should still go to New York, or not, up to them. I wouldn’t insist on going if they didn’t want me to. My mom looked at me and said, with her beautiful Colombian accent, “Oh you’re going!” If you ask my mom, she’ll tell you she always knew I would be an actor.
My parents have always been incredibly supportive of everything I have ever done. I know, I am so lucky to have, and have had, that and it’s something I will never take for granted. They both flew with me to New York to set me up in the housing at AMDA and I can still remember clearly our last moments together before they left and I began living away from home for the very first time. Before my final semester at AMDA, I booked my first Union job on a Theatre for Young Audiences contract. I left school early, technically still graduating, got my Equity Union card and started my professional acting career.
In the ten years I spent living in New York, I completed a musical theatre acting conservatory program, did 4 national tours, got married, got a dog, got depressed, decided I needed a degree, took a class at La Guardia Community College (yes, another college) and got divorced which led me to move back to California in 2011. I missed my ten-year anniversary as a New Yorker by two months.
After a cross country, road trip back to California, I spent the Fall of 2011 recovering from the loss of New York, started dating my current beau and partner, Peter Kreder, decided to finally pursue that degree and registered for the Winter session at Fullerton College. (I think we’re at four colleges now, if you’re counting.) It was towards the end of that first semester as a full-time student that I found out I was expecting a baby. That summer I moved in with Peter and in December of 2012, our son James was born. Fun Fact: I went into labor on the last day of the semester and ended up missing two of my finals. One just turned out to be a surprise baby shower, that I obviously missed, but I did have to make up the other final the following semester. Also, Fun Fact: My beau and partner, Peter Kreder is the current Artistic Director of the Costa Mesa Playhouse. I decided to continue going to school even after I had my son, and with the love and support of my entire family I was able to continue my studies and eventually transferred to, you guessed it, a fifth school. In 2017, I graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Musical Theatre with honors in Musical Theatre and Acting from the University of California, Irvine and finally got my degree. Zot! Zot! (If you know, you know.)
Over the course of my theatre career, I have had the privilege of performing in some incredibly special places such as Radio City Music Hall, The Kennedy Center, The Kodak Theatre (now known as the Dolby Theatre), The Walt Disney Concert Hall with the LA Philharmonic, and Segerstrom Hall at the Orange County Performing Arts Center. Some of my favorite roles include Tracy Turnblad in Hairspray (Palos Verdes Performing Arts), Eva Perón in Evita (Irvine, Barclay), Gabby in American Mariachi (South Coast Repertory), and Dora in Dora The Explorer Live! (Equity National Tour)
In 2020 I decided to pursue on-camera acting opportunities and after booking and shooting my very first commercial, the world came to a halt. During the Covid quarantine I buckled down and did the other thing I do best, I became a student again. I took online Acting for Camera classes, Voice Over classes, and an Audiobook narrator course. I have, since, joined SAG-Aftra and these days you can see or hear my work in commercials, films, Television, Audiobooks and the stage. When I’m not performing, I’m busy and happy being a mom, working as a teaching Artist for the Laguna Playhouse, and when I can afford to, you can find me still taking classes to maintain and learn new skills. And yes, I’ve thought about going back to school. I think about it all the time. For what, I don’t know. For directing, for writing, marketing… I just always want to be learning and growing. I like to consider myself a life-time student . Maybe that’s my true calling.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I think my first major “obstacle” was being a first generation American with parents who didn’t go to school in this country. My parents didn’t really know how to help guide me through college here and I was kind of aimlessly wandering as a “music major” for four years until my voice teacher helped guide me in the right direction. I didn’t realize I could pursue acting or musical theatre as a major.
Another challenge I’ve experienced throughout my entire career is being Latina in a white-centered business and a white-centered artform. There was almost no representation of Latine characters other than West Side Story and a few single stereotypical characters throughout the broadway cannon until Lin Manuel Miranda’s In The Heights came out in 2008. And being a white presenting Latina, I benefitted from white privilege and had some performing opportunities that, I’m sure, my more Native presenting Latino brothers and sisters did not. But it wasn’t until In The Heights, that I felt truly represented. And as a Latina, when you stop and think about this, it is a very emotional thing. Because even though I did have some performing opportunities, it was like I was suppressing who I truly am. Because I guess I was “white passing” without even realizing it.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I would say, and I think most people who have worked with me would say, that I specialize in comedy. I’ve had directors and fellow actors and even just friends and family tell me that I am naturally funny my whole life and they say “you can’t teach that.” So it’s an honor to be cast in comedic roles really. Especially because I was raised on I Love Lucy, Laugh In, and The Carol Burnette Show. I love to make people laugh and even though I love a good dramatic monologue like the next actor, comedy always feels like home to me.
I think what I’m most proud of and what sets me apart from others is my own unique combination of drive and passion when I set my mind to do something. I remember finding out at the end of the 2015 school year when I was a student at UC Irvine that the following year they would be doing Evita as a MainStage show. One of my dream roles. So that summer, I trained vocally and physically all summer long so that I could be considered for the role. I came back to school in the fall having lost around 35 pounds and ready to belt my face off. I auditioned and got cast as Eva Peron. I also got into the advanced Musical Theatre Class, as well as their New York Satellite program and was accepted Into the BFA program that same Fall.
Are there any books, apps, podcasts or blogs that help you do your best?
BOOKS: I just started reading The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron and I can’t wait to start putting it all into practice. I fall into the “post show blues” after not only shows but basically any projects I do. So I’m excited to give this a try since it seems to work well as a life practice for so many people.
APPS: Audible, Libby etc. As an audiobook narrator myself, I learn a lot by listening to other narrators. And as a person who has always struggled with reading, it has been so wonderful to finally be able to connect to the literary world of which I always felt so left out of. It’s amazing to finally be able to say “have your read this book?” or “Yes! I did read that book” and Yes! listening to audiobooks DOES COUNT as reading!
PODCASTS: I listen to the Getting Things Done podcast when I need help getting motivated to organize my life. Sometimes they include a guided “mind sweep” where you basically do a brain dump and write out everything that is on your mind as it pops into your head. In theory and in practice this helps clear your mind and make space for what’s important.
PLANNER: I started using a Passion Planner this year and I’m OBSESSED! I use colorful pens and stickers and it brings me joy while making me more productive and organized. Not only that but it’s a small, woman owned business based in San Diego that gives back and is eco conscious.
CLASSES: JMKaudition.com for On-Camera audition class, The Great Audiobook Adventure for narration, SoundOnStudio.com for Voice Over.
COMMUNITY: Latinas Acting Up!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.luzmaortiz.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/luzmaortizactress
- Facebook: https://resumes.actorsaccess.com/LuzmaOrtiz
- Twitter: https://pro.imdb.com/name/nm8938361?s=7acbaf51-2693-4dad-2acf-f6e37885e2cd&site_preference=normal
- Youtube: https://www.audible.com/search?keywords=Luzma+Ortiz&k=Luzma+Ortiz&sprefix=%2Cna-audible-us%2C441&i=na-audible-us&url=search-alias%3Dna-audible-us&ref=nb_sb_noss_2
Image Credits
Hairspray- Palos Verdes Performing Arts
American Mariachi- Tania Thompson/South Coast Repertory
Nate The Great- Tania Thompson/South Coast Repertory
Aubergine- Jordan Kubat/South Coast Repertory
In the booth- Luzma Ortiz
On the set of Miami Bici 2- Luzma Ortiz
Evita- ©(2016) UC Regents, all rights reserved. Photo by Paul Kennedy.
Evita- ©(2016) UC Regents, all rights reserved. Photo by Paul Kennedy.
Man of La Mancha- ©(2015) UC Regents, all rights reserved. Photo by Paul Kennedy.
