Moreno awarded the George Eastman Award
Rita Moreno radiated youthfulness and humor from the stage at the Dryden theater in Rochester. Moreno was answering press questions about winning the 2025 George Eastman Award. The internationally known actor, singer, and dancer held a Puerto Rican flag in one hand and hot chocolate in the other while sporting a sleek black baseball cap atop a silver bob. It was obvious that she had years of performing still ahead of her—after all, this Hollywood powerhouse is only ninety-three years old.
The George Eastman Award was established in 1955 to celebrate individuals, like Moreno, who have made major contributions to the film industry. Moreno’s career spans across eight decades. She is part of an exclusive group of performers to boast EGOT status, a title given to those who have earned all four artistic awards: Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony. Moreno was the third person ever to achieve EGOT status; today only twenty-one performers have the distinction of being EGOT winners.
Moreno first earned the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1961 for her portrayal of Anita in West Side Story. In 1973, she won a Grammy Award for Best Album for Children for The Electric Company. She earned the Tony Award for Best Supporting or Featured Actress in a Play in 1975 for playing Googie Gomez in The Ritz. Moreno achieved EGOT status in 1977 after earning an Emmy for her appearance on The Muppet Show.
Moreno’s illustrious career earned her other awards and honors, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, National Medal of the Arts, Screen Actors Lifetime Achievement Award, Kennedy Center Honor, and the Peabody Career Achievement Award.
Still, Moreno was humbled to receive the George Eastman Award. “I thought all of that was over,” says Moreno, “and yet, here I am, and here you are. I could not be more proud and humble, really, to have been recognized by this august, amazing company. It’s one of those dreams that you never had because you didn’t dare it come true.”
Moreno joins the list of more than sixty actors, directors, and cinematographers who are George Eastman Award recipients. Recent recipients include Goldie Hawn, who was honored in 2024, and Jodie Foster, who was honored in 2023. “And Eastman, that’s a huge, huge name,” says Moreno, “Look at what he did, look at what he accomplished.” Moreno is the third Latino winner of a George Eastman Award. She follows the legacies of actors Ramon Navarro and Dolores Del Rio.
While Moreno has had a successful career, she did not have the easiest start. Directors and producers would not consider her for roles she connected with because of her Puerto Rican heritage. She remembers holding back tears as casting agents told her that she wouldn’t be considered for certain roles.
As she was being passed up for roles she wanted, she was cast to play characters of various ethnicities with dark skin, even though she was not a part of those ethnic and racial communities and she had fair skin. Even for her breakout role in West Side Story, she was forced to wear makeup to make her skin darker. The makeup was so different from her skin tone that it would streak.
“One day I was so annoyed, and I said, ‘I don’t understand this. I’m Puerto Rican, what do you mean you have to color my face?’” says Moreno, “And [the makeup artist] actually said to me, ‘What, are you prejudiced?’ I don’t think any of us were happy about having one color, but it’s how it was.”
Despite her negative experiences in the industry, Moreno has hope for future generations. “You have more of a voice now than we did when I was in movies, way more of a voice,” she says. “Use it and try not to get enraged—because that’s the natural reaction, because you are enraged when you are helpless. Helplessness does that to you.”
When asked what she would say to her younger self, Moreno laughs and says, “Wait till you see what happens.”
Moreno was always a performer, even before she received formal training. When she was three years old, she would dance for her grandpa in his home in Puerto Rico. After Moreno moved to New York City, her mom’s friend, who was a dancer, encouraged her mom to sign her up for dance lessons. “I’ve been doing this since knee-high to a grasshopper, as they say,” says Moreno, “Some people are really just wired that way, and I think I was one of those people.”
One role Moreno is especially fond of is Googie Gomez from The Ritz, as Moreno had a hand in creating this character. Moreno was doing an impression of an original character at a party. Moreno’s lively delivery caught the attention of playwright Terrence McNally, who decided he was going to write a part for her character.
“I still love her, and I still do her all the time with my friends, once in a while at a party because she is so full of herself,” says Moreno, “Googie Gomez thinks she’s God’s gift to the entertainment world. She has no idea that she has maybe the world’s worst singing voice. Cannot dance, but dances. That’s truly my métier.”
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