Center Stage: Cesar Jesus Garcia

Cesar Jesus Garcia knew he wanted to act for the rest of his life when he was in the second grade, where in a school production he played his first leading role as George Washington.

“In second grade we were given a sheet of paper to write down what we wanted to be when we grew up,” Garcia said. “Everyone put down fireman, policeman. I put, ‘I want to be a movie star.’”

Garcia, 22, attended PSJA Memorial High School in Alamo where he participated in University Interscholastic League as well as Texas Forensic Association acting competition.

“I was more involved my junior and senior years,” he said. “Those were my more successful years, which reinforced the passion I had for theater.”

“I wanted to become an actor because … there are a lot of messages and a lot of stories out there,” he said. “I like for the theater to be the vehicle by which those stories are delivered.”

During his high school senior year in 2005 Garcia won UIL’s best actor award at state-level one-act play competition in Austin.

“Senior year is what really made me decide that this is what I wanted to do as my career,” he said.

After graduation he attended Webster University in St. Louis, Mo., from where he graduated in May with a bachelor’s degree in theater.

“People walk around holding things in all day and I think the theater really helps a person release some stress,” he said. “You take them into another world.”

Garcia works as a substitute teacher for the Pharr-San Juan-Alamo school district and volunteers time directing productions at his church.

He is now writing a one-man show in which he plans to star and hopes to have completed in December.

“I plan to go to (Los Angeles) to pursue an acting career there,” he said.

Submit Slice of Life suggestions to Managing Editor Lucio Castillo or City Editor Charlene Vandini at 430-6244 or charlenev@valleystar.com.