Dan Guerrero, the son of a legendary Chicano music icon, returns to the Tucson stage with his one-person show. “¡Gaytino!” chronicles his life growing up as a gay man who went on to a Broadway stage career, and later as a talent agent and producer.
Guerrero, the son of Eduardo “Lalo” Guerrero, considered the father of Chicano music, will stage his monologue at the Rialto Theatre tonight, eight years after he first presented it in his hometown.
But in those passing years, Guerrero has tweaked the evolving show.
“The point is I’m telling my own story,” said Guerrero, a frequent visitor to Tucson, where he has performed in Borderlands Theater’s annual “A Tucson Pastorela,” playing the lead role of Lucifer. His Rialto performance precedes a second, ticketed show by La Maldita Vecindad, a leading Mexican rock group celebrating 30 years.
Guerrero wrote “¡Gaytino!” in 2005 as a response to the lack of Latinos and gay Latinos on television and stage.
“There were very few Chicano stories out there,” he said in a telephone interview from his West Hollywood home.
While his show is autobiographical, it is also as much about his father, a towering figure in music, who died in 2005, and influential Chicano artist Carlos Almaraz, Guerrero’s childhood friend who died of AIDS in 1989. The show also incorporates Chicano civil rights history of the 1960s and 1970s.
“I’ve lived it,” he said.
Since he debuted his show, Guerrero said he has performed it several times a year. He recently staged the show in Los Angeles where his father moved the family to achieve his fame as a musician and composer.
Guerrero said he has no plans to expand his show but there are plans afoot to record “¡Gaytino!” in a five-camera, high-definition format.
In addition to performing on stage, Guerrero will be the celebrity grand marshal for the LGBT Freedom Day parade on Friday. The parade will begin at 5:30 p.m. in front of the St. Agustine Cathedral on 192 S. Stone Avenue and end at the Tucson Meet Yourself Festival in Presidio Park.
He also will be a guest speaker at the annual dinner to celebrate National Latino AIDS Awareness Day at El Casino Ballroom on Oct. 15.
