La Prensa de San Antonio.- Dora Peña is an independent filmmaker in San Antonio – she‘s the whole package: director, writer, producer and actress. Her first full-length feature film, “Dream Healing” was filmed entirely in San Antonio and was screened here for the first time in 2009. Together, with her husband and co-producer, Manuel J. Peña, the 30-year-old filmmaker believes the current film scene in San Antonio is an inviting place to make movies.
She encourages other filmmakers to go out and do it, and learn about the craft and the business. Peña, a 2001 recipient of the Latino Public Broadcasting Emerging Digital Producers Grant for the Director, told success stories of teen mothers, including her own.
Her first short film, Crazy Life, was funded by a Director’s Award from the San Antonio Office of Cultural Affairs and is now in distribution by Vanguard International Cinema. Peña is also an alumnus of 2007 Creative Capital Artist Prof Workshop, the 2003 NALIP Latino Producer’s Academy and Latino Writer’s Lab.
Currently Peña, also the mother of three sons, is working on “La Malinche,” about a tribal Mexican woman thought to be the lover of Hernan Cortez, the historical figure. Although not a film, the stage show will should open in September in San Antonio.
“Ultimately, I’d like to have a studio in San Antonio and we can make some damn good films,” she said. Peña, who grew up in San Antonio, tells stories that come from the heart. “I’m trying to paint my painting,” she added.
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