Esai Morales

Esai Morales, the illustrious award-winning actor, is a figure of royalty among the entertainment industry. Born in Brooklyn to Puerto Rican parents, Morales had his start on the stage, appearing in El Hermano at the Ensemble Theatre Studio and at New York's Shakespeare Festival In The Park in The Tempest. His feature film debut in Bad Boys and his breakthrough role as Bob Morales in La Bamba made him a star, contributing to making the film the most commercially successful Latino-themed Rock biopic of all time. His remarkable career continues to this day with a plethora of roles on stage and film. Not content with simply making a name for himself, Morales co-founded the National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts, created to advance the presence of Latinos in the media, telecommunications and entertainment industries. This foundation has provided hundreds of Hispanic students with scholarships in excess of 1 million dollars. Truly, Morales is a paragon of success, using his status to benefit his community and to create a lasting legacy of excellence.