The film Zoot Suit is adapted from a play written/produced by Daniel Valdez, dir

The film Zoot Suit is adapted from a play written/produced by Daniel Valdez, director of El Teatro Campesino, widely recognized as the group that sparked the Cultural Renaissance of the Chicano Civil Rights Movement. Zoot Suit was the first (and perhaps only) Chicano play on Broadway. For the purposes of this class, I am especially interested in the pachuco character looming in the background of Henry Reyna’s mind, because it connects with a good deal of literature about Mexican-American male youth. Note that there is a documentary about the the zoot suit “riots” to start off this section, followed by several articles about zoot suit subculture of the 1930s and 1940s. Should be interesting reading. Perhaps the best discussion question is to take a step back, so to say, and think about how the events in the film might be explained by or connect with The Street Gang and Reaching the Fighting Gang?
You can visit the website for Teatro Campesino here: http://suteatro.org/daniel-valdez-here/Links to an external site.