Actress and singer/songwriter Jackie Cruz came to speak at Brandeis on March 3. The event was sponsored by Brandeis Television (BTV) and was held in Schwartz Hall. Cruz plays the role of Marisol “Flaca” Gonzales on the critically-acclaimed Netflix original TV series “Orange is the New Black.”
Cruz spoke to an auditorium full of students, telling of her path to stardom and how she got into acting. Born in the Dominican Republic to a teenage mother, she was raised by her mother and four aunts.
At age 16 Cruz and her mother moved to Hollywood so she could pursue her dreams. Cruz attended Hamilton Music Academy, where her determination was tested; she had a teacher who refused to cast her in any plays. Cruz said, “I wasn’t in any plays in high school. She didn’t believe in me. I was like ‘All right, you know what, I’m still going to try.’”
Cruz could not be deterred from pursuing her dreams, no matter what obstacles were thrown her way. When she was 17, she got into a major car accident. The driver lost control and the car flipped over three times and sent Cruz, who wasn’t wearing a seatbelt, through the windshield. She was taken to the hospital, where she had brain surgery.
“I woke up two weeks later, not knowing what happened, with a tube down my throat,” Cruz said. Looking in the mirror in the hospital, she said, “I try to smile but I can’t because my face is paralyzed. Right then I was like, my dreams are done.”
In the hospital, Cruz struggled. “It was really scary,” she said. “I had to learn how to walk … I couldn’t even smile. I’m crying every night.” While in the hospital, Cruz met an eight-year-old girl who had also had brain surgery. Although Cruz had to learn how to walk again, this little girl would be paralyzed for the rest of her life, and she said she had been sent to cheer Cruz up.
“That little girl changed my life,” said Cruz. She continued to get better in the months following the accident; she was able to walk and smile again. Eight months after the accident, she returned to Hollywood, just as determined to follow her dreams as ever.
Although she focused on acting at first, the jobs were few and far between. She focused on her music, because she had always loved to sing. After moving to New York, she released an EP in 2010. She said, “I still haven’t made a dollar from music yet … that’s okay. I just love to sing.”
Even though the EP did not launch her music career, once again Cruz did not become discouraged. She had started to miss acting, so she got her first audition in five years, for a Netflix show called “Orange is the New Black.”
