The best advice I ever got when I was starting out: Never give up. And I never did.
Rita Moreno
After Rita Moreno won an Oscar for the role of Anita in the 1961 film “West Side Story,” she waited seven years for her next film. Moreno had aspirations for herself beyond the stereotypical “island girl” box Hollywood wanted to put her into, and the roles she was offered weren’t of the caliber she felt she deserved. In 1969, she starred in "The Night of the Following Day" alongside Marlon Brando, and her star kept rising from there. The triple threat’s perseverance paid off: She became the first Latina performer to EGOT (that is, win an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony), among countless other honors that make her a living legend. Even when the industry wanted to give up on Moreno, she never gave up on herself: She chose the challenging path, and in the end, it was the most gratifying one.
