Alfonso Arau has had a long and fruitful career both in front of and behind the camera and is one of the most prominent Latino film-makers in Hollywood. He was a drama disciple of Seki Sano--a Japanese teacher, classmate of Lee Strasberg with Konstantin Stanislavski in Russia--and traveled the world from 1964 to 1968 with his one-man show, "Pantomime Happy Madness", after studying with Etienne Decroux and Jacques Lecoq in Paris.A renowned writer-producer-director-actor in theater and film for more than twenty years, in 1969 he directed his first feature film, El águila descalza (1971), in which he also starred. He has directed many films in Mexico, among them Calzonzín inspector (1974) and Mojado Power (1981). He has received six Arieles--the Mexican equivalent of the Oscar--and numerous international film awards.Arau has acted in a number of Mexican and Hollywood films, including La Horde sauvage (1969), El topo (1970), Mojado Power (1981), La grosse magouille (1980), À la poursuite du diamant vert (1984), ¡Trois amigos! (1986) and Committed (2000). In addition to Les épices de la passion (1992), his directing credits include Les vendanges de feu (1995) with Keanu Reeves and Morceaux choisis (2000) with Woody Allen. For television he has done La splendeur des Amberson (2002), based on the script of Orson Welles' film version (La splendeur des Amberson (1942)) and the novel by Booth Tarkington.
