El Corrido

El Corrido
El Corrido
	El Carpa de Los Rasquachis
Directed by	Luis Valdez Kirk Browning
Screenplay by	Luis Valdez
Based on	La Gran Carpas de los Rasquachis
Produced by	Barbara Schultz
Starring	Felix Alvarez, Lily Alvarez, Daniel Valdez, Luis Valdez, Jose Delgado, Socorro Cruz
Production; company	PBS
Distributed by	PBS
Release date	November 4, 1976;
Running time	109 minutes
Country	United States Mexico
Language	Spanish

El Corrido is a 1976 musical comedy made for TV film directed and written by Luis Valdez, and produced by El Teatro Campesino.^[1] The film was adapted from Valdez's stage musical La Gran Carpa de los Rasquachis, which was also produced with El Teatro Campesino.^[2] El Corrido was aired on PBS on November 4, 1976 as part of its Ballad of a Farmworker television series on the series Visions.^[3]^[4]

The film stars Felix Alvarez as Jesus Pelado Rasquachi, a young Mexican man who travels to the United States in search of work, suffering various unfortunate and comical events along the way.

Plot

The story begins with a young man named Beto (Daniel Valdez) questioning an old man with a guitar (Luis Valdez) about going to America to seek work, as they ride in a truck for the border. The old man decides to narrate the story of Jesus Pelado Rasquachi (Felix Alvarez) in order to show the young man what America is really like. Jesus Pelado Rasquachi finds himself unable to secure employment in the fictional Mexican town of Guangoche, and desires to migrate to the United States in search of a job.^[5] Due to his inability to pay a smuggler the fee for border crossing, he comes in contact with El Diablo (Jose Delgado), a mobster who he ends up borrowing money from. Even after borrowing the money Rasquachi is unable to cross the border due to his lack of both American money with which to bribe the guards or an American sponsor. Due to his lack of legal employment, Rasquachi is forced to work low-paying and difficult jobs at the behest of the smuggler who contracts him to various ranchers on the border near Ciudad Juarez. Rasquachi continues to work around the western area of the United States, poorly paid and subjected to poor working conditions before finally ending up in an area resembling Los Angeles, where he dies an old man, having met death (Socorro Cruz). The old man finishes his story and mysteriously disappears, when Beto is accosted by a series of farm workers who demand to know the story of Jesus Pelado Rasquachi. Beto then tells the story himself, leading the crowd away as the old man wanders down the road towards America.

Cast

Felix Alvarez as Jesus Pelado Rasquachi
Lily Alvarez as Rasquachi's Wife
Daniel Valdez as Beto
Luis Valdez as Old Narrator
Jose Delgado as El Diablo and Truck Driver
Socorro Cruz as Death and Foreman

Production

El Corridor was first produced as a stage musical with El Teatro Campesino as La gran Carpa de los RasquachisI. Valdez made many revisions to the story of El Corrido over the 60's and 70's, before culminating in his most polished version of the play. Valdez was known for the musical style known as corrido, a narrative form of storytelling that heavily incorporated Mexican folk music and rhythm, which he incorporated into the musical.^[6] When adapting the play for PBS, Valdez had to shorten the musical for its PBS adaptation, El Corrido.^[3] Part of the film was taped as a stage production.^[2]

Style

Luis Valdez and El Teatro Campesino were known for their use of corrido in conjunction with the Mexican carpa (Comedic shows usually arranged out of tents) to portray modern life for farm-workers and migrants. While El Corrido is a comedy like most carpa's, El Corrido was especially known for its usage of supernatural elements and very dark humor to establish morality and spiritual conflict ^[7] El Teatro Campesino was also notable for their use of actual migrants in their plays, they often cast family members and nearby workers in order to maintain authenticity in their work.^[8]

References

^ Noriega, Chon A. (2000). Shot in America: Television, the State, and the Rise of Chicano Cinema. U of Minnesota Press. pp. 120, 126–130. ISBN 9781452904276.
^ ^a ^b Huerta, Jorge; Jorge, Huerta (November 16, 2000). Chicano Drama: Performance, Society and Myth. Cambridge University Press. p. 123. ISBN 9780521778176.
^ ^a ^b Cienfuegos, Javier (December 17, 2014). "La Carpa De Los Rasquachis". Latino/a Mobility in California History. Retrieved May 7, 2019.
^ Martinez, Julio A. (1979). Chicano Scholars and Writers: A Bio-bibliographical Directory. Scarecrow Press. p. 531. ISBN 9780810812055.
^ Cienfuegos, Javier (January 1, 2015). "Race and Migration in the United States". Latino Mobility in California History. Retrieved May 7, 2019.
^ Broyles-Gonzales, Yolanda (1994). El Teatro Campesino: Theater in the Chicano Movement. Austin Texas: University of Texas Press.
^ Harding, James M and Cindy Rosenthal (2006). Restaging the Sixties: Radical Theaters and Their Legacies. Michigan: Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
^ Guthmann, Edward (September 6, 2008). "Four Generations of El Teatro Campesino Actors". SF GATE. Retrieved May 7, 2019.