Renée Victor – Biography

Beloved by many fans, Renée Victor remains one of the most delightful talents in entertainment. Critics and admirers have acknowledged her range as an actress with a gallery of indelible roles, equally adept at handling drama and comedy.

The public best knows Renée Victor for her wisecracking role as “Lupita” in the landmark Showtime series “Weeds.” Her portrayal has earned her critical praise as a character who avoids the usual stereotype. Fast and feisty, Lupita is bursting with energy, shooting clever barbs at unsuspecting characters. Critics nationwide have joined the many fans who admire her spirit and wit. Here are some critics’ comments:
“’Weeds’ Renée Victor, as Nancy’s maid, is the best lippy servant since Rosario on “Will & Grace” wrote Terry Morrow of the Scripps Howard News Service.

New York Post TV critic Linda Stasi wrote: “Lastly and bestly there’s ‘Lupita’ (Renée Victor) the Botwin’s housekeeper (“I’m nobody’s maid”) who delivers some of the funniest lines on television in the last 10 years. And I mean that!” She later wrote “Thank God Lupita (Renée Victor) – who had the best line in all of television last season (the one about the coffee table) – is back, and by episode two, she’s had two more potentially best lines. The woman’s a comic genius and I love her so.”

Referring to her classic “Weeds” line, costar Kevin Nealon — after her priceless delivery — asked her “What’s it like not only delivering the best line in the show, but one that’s become a TV classic?”

“On the heels of her second season on “Weeds” as Lupita, Ms. Victor was cast as “Mommie” in the indie feature “Hollywood Familia” which quickly earned her advance praise from Director-Producer Frank Aragon:
“We have a wonderful performance from Renée, whose portrayal of “Mommie” is one of those magical moments when actress and character fuse absolutely. She deftly balances the humor and drama in an astonishing tour de force. Renée unleashes a colorful, quirky persona that tickles the funny bone of anyone who recalls a grandmother steeped in cultural rites and practices white magic behind closed doors. Renée not only steals the show, but steals your heart”. Aragon decided from the beginning to submit Renée for Academy Award nomination.

The new Disney-Pixar joint animation film “Coco” promises to have an enormous impact on animation films and Renée’s role as the Grandmother in a film directed by veteran Lee Unkrich (“Toy Story 2-4,” “Monsters, Inc.”), has all he earmarks of a breakout role.
Renée Victor has worked alongside many of Hollywood’s elite including Robert Duvall, Walter Matthau, Andy Garcia, Christopher Walken, William Hurt, Isai Morales, Josh Brolin, Gena Rowlands, Mary Louise Parker and Scarlett Johansson.
In Duvall’s “The Apostle” as the Hispanic Evangelical interpreter to his sermon, she holds her own side-by-side with one of America’s greatest actors. Impressed with her work in “The Apostle,” Duvall subsequently cast Ms. Victor in two of his other films including “Assassination Tango” and “A Night in Old Mexico.”

For her title role in the indie film “Libertad” she received the Best Actress Award at the Napa Valley Film Festival. Director Miguel Najera said: “Without Renée’s magnificent performance in my first film, ‘Libertad,’ it would not have received the accolades that it did. Her portrayal of Libertad, a strong, independent woman tempered with tenderness, personified how the Mexican female spirit survived in a man’s world. Her presence filled the screen and the hearts of all those fortunate enough to witness how effortlessly she moved them from laughter to tears to triumph.” She is also proud to have performed the English voices of Helena in Ingmar Bergman’s Oscar-winning film “Fanny and Alexander”; the voice of Ginger in Federico Fellini’s “Ginger and Fred”; the Spanish voice of the Gargoyle in Disney’s “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”; and multiple voices in the award-winning animated video game “Skyrim: The Elder Scrolls.”

Television recurring roles besides “Weeds” include “ER” and “Tyler Perry’s House of Payne.” Other TV credits include “Major Crimes,” “The Witches of East End,” “Children’s Hospital,” “Women’s Murder Club,” “All You’ve Got,” “Strong Medicine,” “Mister Sterling,” “Elian Gonzales” and many more. She has also performed on public radio, KCRW, for the prestigious Los Angeles Theater Classics “The Play’s The Thing.”

Renée has also garnered a wealth of critical praise for her theater work. On her performance at San Jose Repertory Theater’s production of “My Visits With MGM” ─ spotlighted, Victor opens the play singing the classic and heartfelt “Valentina” torch style and acapella. Victor’s rendition was a special moment setting the entire mood of the play.

Judith Green of the Mercury News wrote: “Renée Victor a tiny, joyous, enchanting performer gives Grandmother Marta enough fizz for a magnum of champagne and has a special beauty appropriate to a play that takes place largely in the faded colors of the past. She is also an accomplished dancer, which she puts to good use here at the delight of the audience.”

On her repeat performance of “My Visits With MGM” at Milwaukee Repertory Theater, The Journals’ Damien Jacques wrote: “Renée Victor gives Marta Grande an amazing amalgam of warmth, humor, strength and sexiness.”

In “Our Lady of The Tortilla” at the Phoenix Theater, Julie Amparano of Arizona Republic wrote: “Victor’s performance is a highlight. With a surprised naïveté Victor plays Dolores as a Hispanic version of Edith Bunker.”

Since her dancing debut singing in the opera “Carmen” at the age of 10, Renée Victor has been singing and dancing professionally in every performing medium. Her professional career began when her performance proved a double-threat talent as a dancer/singer, extending a two-week Las Vegas engagement at the Stardust Hotel into an historical, unprecedented record-breaking fourteen months. Subsequent critically-acclaimed work throughout the famous Nevada circuit eventually led to the stages of Europe, Latin America, the Far East and the South Pacific.

After hosting her popular variety series in Australia Ms. Victor, on her return to LA, choreographed and/or was featured dancer in: “The Doctor,” “Salsa,” “The Barry Manilow Special,” “Suddenly Susan,” “The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit,” “Diagnosis Murder,” “Bob!,” “Land’s End,” “Veronica Claire,” “Men Behaving Badly,” “Parallel Lives,” “The Neon Bible,” “Everything’s George,” “Kiss Me A Killer,” “The Big City,” “Fear of Dancing and Other Diseases,” “The Summer of My Deflowering,” “30 Minutes at Gunsight,” “The Harry Belafonte Show,” “Perez Prado Review,” “The Afrison Cuban Concert at the L.A. Theater Center” and numerous Jerry Jackson Reviews (Mr. Jackson was Artistic Director of The Folies Bergère in both Paris and Las Vegas.)

By now the mix of her accomplishments hosting, singing and dancing—including commercial singing jingles for RC Cola, Hoffy Hot Dogs and Twin Dragon Chinese Cookies—led to a creative collaboration with famed pianist Eddie Cano (“A Taste of Honey”) as her accompanist. To this day it remains the highlight of her singing experience.

After her extended success in Australia and New Zealand she returned to L.A. She hosted KTLA’s “Pacesetters” for 3 years; was translator-interpreter at the ’84 L.A. Olympics in the International Broadcasting Center; translated and adapted a program for the California Museum of Science and Industry on AIDS, hosted by Edward James Olmos; and translated the “The Nutcracker Suite” into Spanish for the BBC of London.

She was also segment producer for the “Paul Rodriguez Show,” narrated “The Art of the Pacific Rim-Meso American Art” for the L.A. County Museum of Art and “La Ofrenda – The Day of the Dead” (Women In Films entry at the Los Angeles Film Festival). While journalist/reporter for Pacifica Radio KPFK she produced and hosted a special feature on world acclaimed award-winning novelist Carlos Fuentes.

Her studies at the University of Texas, American Film Institute, Jackie Cowgill of AADA, Improv with Gary Austin, Shirley Prestia, Kip King and Lindsay Crouse; the Sydney Conservatory of Music, the Columbia School of Broadcasting and the Hollywood Scriptwriter’s Institute, all further honing her craft as an actor and expanding her experience in the challenging field she has chosen.

The multi-lingual Texas-born Renée is single, enjoys movies, theater, museums, poetry (especially Pablo Neruda, Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz & Michael Hannon), music, travel and cooking for small intimate gatherings with friends and family…and especially in the company of daughters Margo and Raquel.