Cindy in Lala Land

Cindy Vela is a woman with secrets.

The Valley native has learned to keep those secrets during her first year as an actress and model in Hollywood.

Her hidden knowledge doesn’t concern some dirty secret from a dark and stormy past or whether some pop tart was seen somewhere with somebody.

Instead, Cindy has to keep mum about the future. Just because she is offered a new project doesn’t mean it’s time to pop the cork on the old bubbly.

“I’ve learned not to get all excited and call my mom and dad whenever something comes up,” she said recently by phone.

Cindy said there are meetings and casting sessions all of the time for projects that never see the light of day, be they TV shows, movies or musical groups.

Other times, she has to sign confidentiality agreements.

Instead, she concentrates on the steady stream of work that has come her way.

“I keep busy,” she said. “I know nobody is going to do it for me. I’ve got to do it on my own.”

Cindy has appeared in music videos for a host of artists, including Christina Aguilera and Daddy Yankee. She’ll be seen in the next Santana video, “Into the Night.”

Her mother recently walked into a Wells Fargo branch in Brownsville and there was Cindy on a poster and brochures for first time home buyers.

“You have to learn not to take things personally,” she said. “They’re looking for a certain thing and if you don’t fit the mold, they’re not going to call you back.

“It’s not that you’re no good or that you have no promise. They’re looking for a product.”

Cindy said some very important casting directors and other actors taught her that lesson.

“It’s made it a lot easier for me to go to auditions and not worry about me as a person,” she said. “You go to the audition and try your best and then you forget about it.”

Such is the business that Cindy has been cast in a video, and when she gets to the set, the concept has changed or time is running short. She and the other actors just end up sitting around.

“Of course, we still get paid,” she said.

Cindy, who plays a mean saxophone, spent two years as assistant band director at Memorial Middle School and did acting and modeling on the side.

“I finally realized nobody was going to come knocking on my door,” she said.

During a vacation last year in California, a few mettings with agents and managers convinced her to take the plunge. Within a few weeks she had moved West.

“It’s not easy,” she said. “People have come from all over the world to this one city to compete for the same parts,”

The little girl from Olmito has won her share of roles.

In Daddy Yankee’s video “Impacto,” Cindy is shown riding around in a SUV with the star. The reality is that they were just sitting on chairs. The rest was digitally created.

“When I first came out here I thought I was just going to act,” Cindy said. “I learned quickly that there were so many more things I could do.”

She has worked as a stand-in for Danica Patrick and Fergie among others, been a movie extra, worked on game shows and lots of modeling for magazines.

“I really enjoy seeing all aspects of the business,” Cindy said.

Even when she is not being paid, Cindy goes to shoots.

“It’s always great to be on set and when I get invited, I still go, no matter what,” she said. “I want to see and learn and experience the most I can.”