Pictured: Cast and Crew that Initiated Film Week
By: Dr. Andrew Yox, Honors Director
In a spin-off from Presidential Scholar, Stephanie Hernandez’s prize-winning scholarship last year, Honors Northeast, and the NTCC Webb Society filmed a Mexican-American happening, 4-8 August at NTCC, Titus, Franklin, Marion, and Cass counties. It is a late-twentieth-century story of the struggle for Mexican American identity. The film examines two rival art associations in San Antonio after 1970, both seeking contrasting visions of what it should mean to be Tejano in Texas. “Con Safo,” the Chicano association represented a steep racial ideal of cultural retention. The Community Culture Arts Association (CCOA), on the other hand, lauded progress as a virtue, and the need to lionize successful Mexican-Americans. In the film, group conflict spills over into individual animosities, with the final result that one association collapses, while the other thrives. Viewers at the planned premiere in the spring of 2026 will be able to witness the outcome. Along the way, the film will feature two major Mexican American artists of modern San Antonio, and two major regional figures of the era, Henry Cisneros, the celebrity San Antonio Mayor, and Selena Quintanilla, the Queen of Tejano music.
The honors 2025 cohort pursued what for most was an unprecedented cinematic foray, in a singular manner. Director, Emma Mendoza, the coming Gladys Winkle Scholar of Honors Northeast, expertly balanced time demands and group needs to finish all thirty-one scenes of the script during the annual filmweek of honors. It was the first time since 2017, in an effort directed by Brenda Godoy—now in Med School--that a group was able to do this. It was also the first group in the history of the thus-far thirteen feature-length film series of NTCC to consistently have a good part of the cast and crew waking up each day before 6 a.m. In this endeavor Mendoza was helped by incoming Unit Production Director, Hailey Randall, the adamantine cinematographer, Johnathan Ventura, and a cast that made up in forbearance what they sometimes lacked in memorization. Finally, this group had a penchant for the challenge of outside filming. One-hundred-degree days did not deter them as long as they had access to water. Ventura dramatized the indifference to the heat. He wore a hoodie throughout the week. They recorded beautiful scenes. Time will tell whether Mendoza and Ventura and the rest of the crew were as meticulous with the sound as they were with the integrity of the images they wanted, but their audacity was impressive.
The venture received a considerable boost when sophomore, José Fuentes, the coming Dr. Jerry Wesson Scholar of Honors Northeast, signed on for the difficult role of Mel Casas, a prolific San Antonio artist, and the leader of Con Safo. This completed the inner trio of main actors, the other two returning as veterans from last year: Tristan Dierflinger plays the figurehead of the CCOA, Anastacio Torres, and theatre major, Madeline Simmons, plays the part of Cinthia Garza, a wealthy socialite, and Catholic social activist, whose predilections make her the bellwether for the plot of the film. The veterans Dierflinger, and Simmons acted with particular verve, in some ways redefining and even upstaging their own characters. Their strong cinematic personalities helped fill a vacuum in pathos and dynamism that newer actors with stronger parts could not always realize.
Though this film will make the fourteenth production in a fourteen-year series, there were anxious moments when the enterprise seemed to totter. One student with an important part became very ill on the eve before filmweek. Fortunately, into the breach stepped Alison Majors, the Presidential Scholar who last year played the winsome role of Lady Bird Johnson in the film about Big Oil. Majors not only caught up with the memorization but played her role of Rosie Castro, a leading Chicano, with élan. Without every one of the other actors the story could have capsized. Araceli Landaverde played the important role of Maria Berriozábal, the councilwoman who worked with Henry Cisneros to upgrade the Hispanic West Side. Araceli’s sister, Jasmine, had the important part of Carmen Garza, a model, whose abandonment of the one association signals its defeat. First-year Presidential Scholar, Ian Mares added heft and drama to the character of Felipe Reyes, a key friend of Casas and Con Safo. Remington Covey allowed the film to feature the lead political leader of the era, Henry Cisneros, and Andrew Perez, made the appearance of San Antonio’s great civic artist, Jesse Treviño, possible. Finally, Stephanie Hernandez, the scholar who initiated the whole deep dive into San Antonio’s Tejano art scene, appears at the end of the film in a cameo role as the great singer, Selena Quintanilla.
The effort was beholden to the Whatley Employee Enhancement Fund process overseen by Development Director Nita May, and to the continuing financial support of Jerald and Mary Lou Mowery of Mount Vernon. The Mowerys have been liberal supporters of the film enterprise at NTCC since 2012. They also covered Tuesday’s lunch in Franklin County, and inspirited the film leaders with a previous trip to the Kilgore Shakespeare Festival. The trip to Jefferson that served as the climax of film week was enabled by the family of David L. Stevenson of Longview. This allowed twelve students and professor Yox to experience a three-day-stay in the B&B mansions the town is known for. Though they had permission to film in each of the residences, the directors showed a marked preference for the scenic Kennedy Manor, maintained and owned by Tommy and Tracey Engel of Jefferson. The film movement gathered thrust as well thanks to the encouragement of other members of the community. Publisher of the East Texas Journal, Hudson Old, photographed the group’s official film picture (above) for the ninth time in nine years. In a film dinner in July, NTCC Trustee, Kerry Wootten, his wife Beverly, long-term poster judge, and poet, Dr. Wayne Renning, and his wife Emily, as well as Spanish professor, Dr. Maryna Otero connected with film leaders. Jennifer Gardzina, the wife of NTCC’s director of plant services, Jeffrey Gardzina, came to a planning session at Jo’s, and also helped the group film from the moment they reached Jefferson on Wednesday morning, taking the trip, herself, separately.
Johnathan Ventura, the no-nonsense cinematographer, has earned the title of associate producer and will soon begin to edit the film. The plan is to launch a trailer which can serve to present the film effort to state audiences in Waco, and Nacogdoches, as well as at the National Collegiate Honors Council in San Diego in November. The hope is to present another premiere in the early spring on the campus of Northeast Texas Community College.
