Moctesuma Esparza brings blockbusters, indie films and activism to Salinas.

<></>If a man can be defined simply by metal on his mantle—Emmy, Clio, Cine Golden Eagle—or by the titles after his name—producer, director, writer, Academy Award nominee—then enough has been said about Moctesuma Esparza. To leave it at that, though, is to tell only a fraction of the story about the man behind the opening of Maya Cinemas in Oldtown Salinas this week.

Maya will be like no other local theater. Like the mainstream movie houses, it will debut big box office features. But unlike the others, Maya will toss independent flicks, foreign films, and local interest pictures into the mix.

“One of the things I’m hoping to bring is a diversity—from mainstream to art films to foreign films,” Esparza says.

It’s a hole in the market Esparza says he first noticed while traveling to promote Selena, which helped transform Jennifer Lopez into the J.Lo of current-day Hollywood.

But filling a void doesn’t exactly touch the heart of the man who grew up in the Los Angeles suburb of Boyle Heights, a man who eventually moved miles away but really never left.

It’s a connection to neglected neighborhoods that brought Esparza’s Maya Cinemas to Salinas.

“I noticed the start of this transition to modern stadium-seating theaters, but there were no modern facilities in the old downtowns and in older traditional neighborhoods,” he says. “All of the new construction was in the affluent, new part of town.”

Not this time. The Maya theater, in the 100 block of Oldtown, will include stadium seating, premium sound, crying rooms for noisy kids, and 14 screens.

<>In addition to new releases, the theater will show classics and tributes to the community. The first week, East of Eden and Rebel Without a Cause will play. The following week, in addition to the likes of Dukes of Hazzard, Maya will play a role in the Steinbeck Festival by running Cannery Row, Forgotten Village, and East of Eden. </>

For Esparza, it’s an exciting time, the coming to fruition of a long-held dream of his: To bring big entertainment in a small-town fashion, by seating it in Oldtown’s architectural nirvana and reaching out to its population.

“There was this cannibalization of the old-fashioned theaters,” he says. “Perfectly good theaters might have been in a six-plex or an eight-plex, and they got totally undermined when a new theater came to town.”

Salinas will become the first of Esparza’s Maya theaters, which will eventually span the nation via small cities and old towns.

Salinas Mayor Anna Caballero remembers hearing Esparza’s idea in the fall of 2001. “We were thrilled. It was visionary, fresh, exactly what we wanted and [Esparza] was going to make it happen.”

Esparza’s no newcomer to the movie industry. His credits begin in the ’60s with documentaries, and then he moved to feature films. While his early years produced dismal screen failures (Only Once in a Lifetime), his later works—The Milagro Beanfield War, Gods and Generals, Gettysburg, and Beyond the Sea—have received critical acclaim. They’re not top-grossing films. But to the man who co-founded the National Association of Latino Independent Producers, who’s developing a theater company/performing arts academy in East LA, the thinker movies are a truer reflection of self, even if he doesn’t see it.

“You’re asking me to reflect on myself here. That’s not easy,” he says. And then he’s completely silent.

He’s more at ease talking about the struggles of the masses than he is about the successes of one. It’s a throwback to the 1960s Esparza, when he and thousands of other Los Angeles students walked out of their schools to protest educational biases against Hispanic students. It’s a story Esparza is now producing for HBO called Walkout.

“I don’t know much,” he finally says, “but I know I’m committed to education, social progress, and social justice.”