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Published December 08, 2016
Sometimes, when it rains, it pours. That’s how actor Carlos Gomez feels right now with several film, TV and theater projects he’s working on the next few weeks.
The 54-year-old actor, who calls Los Angeles home for most of the year, is back in the “Big Apple” for a new off-Broadway play. It is only one of several projects he has in the pipeline.
“I’m blessed. I’m very, very happy,” Gomez said on Fox News Latino’s VIP Room recently. “For actors, it’s like all of a sudden you get all this bunch of work and then sometimes you are unemployed for a long time.”
Gomez, who recently appeared on “Madam Secretary,” is taking the stage in the new Off-Broadway play by Pulitzer-Prize winner Quiara Alegria Hudes and director Thomas Khail (“Hamilton”) at the Signature Theatre. He worked with them before on the Tony-Award winning musical “In the Heights.”
“It’s about this little dive bar that’s really a metaphor for a community – a community of people that spans 18 years and you see how each of us grows,” he said. “There’s tragedy, there’s comedy. It’s a great play. Quiara is incredible writer.”
Gomez is joined by “Orange is the New Black” actress Samira Wiley, “Rent” alum Daphne Rubin-Vega and “Fool for Love” actor Gordon Joseph-Weiss.
Gomez said he’s also glad he recently had the opportunity to visit Cuba and work as part of the first U.S. television production to film on the island in decades with Showtime’s “House of Lies,” alongside Don Cheadle.
“That was an incredible experience,” said Gomez, who is of Cuban descent. “Going back to Cuba and working with a Cuban crew and just being in Cuba, it was a mind-blowing experience.”
Gomez has been in the business since the late 1980s – with a notable performance as gay paramedic Raul Melendez on “ER.” But after playing the typical Latino “bad guy,” he made a conscious choice to only take on empowering and positive roles.
“Just put that choice out there,” he said. “I’ve been able to play (them). I was on ‘Madam Secretary’ for the last part of the season playing a special ops guy – a very positive character.”
He said he’s glad he’s able to make such a decision without ruining his career.
“I think the industry is changing, that Hollywood is seeing that we are worth being written better characters and I’ve had the privilege and the honor of playing a lot of these characters,” he added. “But it’s a struggle.”
https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/carlos-gomez-talks-new-off-broadway-show-traveling-to-cuba-for-house-of-lies