Guajira 
El Extremes Electric Cabaret Ibiza 
WEPAwebTV 
New Edge Theater 
roughrican Productions
Channel: Luis Chaluisan
Date: 2014-08-12

Premiering May 5, 2020 
GUAPO - DROP DEAD GORGEOUS 
Dramedy 
With: El Extreme - Spoken Word 
Maria Hernandez - Actor 
Composer - Ralph C. Alvarez 
Director: Mike Tapp 
Branekandi Productions 
New Edge Theater/roughrican Productions 
MNN Time Warner Studios 
Luis Chaluisan, whose parents moved to New York City from Mayaguez Puerto Rico in 1955, was raised in Brooklyn and the Bronx. He received his primary education at Sts. Philip and James and secondary education at Cardinal Hayes High School - Honors Class '75 (both in the Bronx). Chaluisan received his BA in Theater Arts from Amherst College '86. As a child he was influenced by Puerto Rican-Nuyorican-American Rock and Roll-Pop Culture. In 1969 he received a Sears Art School Scholarship based on his Watercolor work. Chaluisan excelled both in Honors academics and track and field while at Cardinal Hayes HS. He was a finalist in the National Junior Olympic Mile Race Summer 1973 (2nd Place held at Van Cortlandt Stadium 4 min. 39 sec.) and was part of the Championship Record Setting Cardinal Hayes Varsity Cross Country Team 1973 With 1. Oscar Amaro '74 2. Richard Zwanzig '74 3. Butch Soares '74 4. Ricardo Morales '74 5. Luis Chaluisan '75 Avg Team Time 14 min. 12 sec. Two and A Half Mile Cross Country Course Van Cortlandt Park September 1973 (a record that still stands.) In 1974 he was granted a Lincoln Center Drama Class Scholarship to study With Marcel Marceau. Chaluisan formed his own Bronx based Dance Company in March 1975 (entitled "Adoracion") and went professional as a folkloric dancer singer in June 1975 with the "Alliance Of Latin Artists" in NYC. Chaluisan was filmed by noted director John David Coles (House Of Cards) while at Amherst College in the fall of 1975. In March 1977 his first Published Poem "Narrative Of A Hybrid" appeared in "The Polemic" Edited by John G. Russell Ph.D. Gifu University. With the publication of “Narrative of a Hybrid” in the Polemic Anthology (1977, Straight Ahead Press Amherst, Massachusetts) Luis Chaluisan joined the ranks of period Nuyorican writers that included Pedro Pietri (“Puerto Rican Obituary” 1973), Miguel Pinero (Short Eyes 1973) and Lefty Barretto (Nobody’s Hero 1976). Mentored by Black Panther cultural minister Ed Bullins and later by Young Lord Eddie Figueroa (founder of the “New Rican Village" on the Lower East Side of New York) Chaluisan was hired by Joe Papp to join the NY Public Theater’s emerging playwright unit headed by Crispin Larengeira in the summer of 1977. A chance meeting with magazine editor-in-chief Soledad Santiago paved the way for Chaluisan to land a job at Latin NY Magazine – the nation’s first successful long term English language monthly publication focusing on Latino (primarily Puerto Rican vis-a-vis Nuyorican) arts and culture. The nineteen year old Chaluisan rose up the ranks from reporter to music editor between 1977-79 under the tutelage of Latin NY publisher Mr Salsa Izzy Sanabria which led to his being hired by WCBS network affiliate WFSB-TV 3   Post Newsweek Broadcastingin Hartford CT as a reporter covering City Hall and the Board Of Education. In 1982 he was hired by  WBGU-TV PBS in Bowling Green, Ohio as a news and arts producer.  For the next twenty five years he worked as a TV investigative reporter, producer, writer and marketing executive. including Telemundo in Tucson, Arizona and Yakima, Washington), WCBS Channel 2 (New York), and News 12 Long Island, along with stints at radio station WGY in Albany among other mainstream media outlets in the US.  Upon leaving the news business in 1997 and resettling in Hartford, CT, Chaluisan (performing as “El Extreme”) began to disseminate work he had developed as a musical composer and poet/essayist with his own indie rock groups dating back to 1982 (Little Otis and The Upsetters, The Blankets of Doom, La Gran Orquesta El Extreme, Gang Bang Bang, and El Extreme’s Electric Cabaret). The effort led to his inclusion in the National Slam Poetry movement as a State Team Slam Champion for CT. (1998/1999 in Austin, Texas and Chicago, Illinois.) His semi-final performance was captured on film by CBS' Sixty Minutes and featured in the news magazine's report on the tenth anniversary of the Slam movement. In 2000 he returned to NYC and set to work on organizing his written work and professional notes describing his media/educational experience which resulted in the off-Broadway play Spic Chic: S.panish P.eople I.n C.ontrol (initially a 2001 workshop at the Nuyorican Café in Manhattan with later runs at the Chelsea Playhouse and Spanish Repertory Theater). The performance at El Repertorio Espanol garnered the attention of producers for the 2004 Biennale Festival in Bonn, Germany where Spic Chic had its European premiere at the Bonn Opera House Theater accompanied by.David Amram In the meantime, Chaluisan was approached by film director Henry Chalfant ("Style Wars”) to contribute both content and interview source material