Nicholas and Derek delve into actress Esther Peralta's inspiring journey, from her Salvadoran heritage into acting in California.

This is Film Center.

Your number one show for real entertainment industry news.

No fluff, all facts.

Now, here are your anchors, Derek Johnson II and Nicholas Killian.

Hey, and welcome to Film Center.

My name is Derek Johnson II.

I'm Nicholas Killian.

And we're here with a very special guest.

You mind introducing yourself?

My name is Esther Peralta.

How are you doing today, Esther?

Oh, I'm doing well.

Awesome.

As you guys know we take the show on the road.

Today we're here at our office in Westlake.

Yeah, Westlake Village.

Yes.

Esther tell me a little about yourself.

Where are you from originally?

Oh interestingly enough, I didn't grow up far from here.

Actually, I was born in Hollywood.

Oh, nice!

I was born, I was, I'm a true It was destiny.

Yeah.

That's called destiny right there.

My parents immigrated to California, to Los Angeles in the early 70s.

Yeah, so From where?

From El Salvador.

Nice.

El Salvador, yeah.

And yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They met each other and fell in love had two kids me and my brother and so what

they both They made each other here.

They made each other in El Salvador They met each other here,

but they're from the same city.

Like what?

Two people are from Santa Clarita, but then they immigrated to

France or something like that.

Wow, that's a match made in heaven.

I guess that's a very good point Big coincidence.

Yeah, very.

It was interesting if my dad knew a lot of my mom's cousins and family . What?

Yeah.

It wasn't like your dad was stalking your mom.

. That's crazy.

That's like saying oh, hey let me introduce your parents

to your significant other.

And they're like, oh, I know this guy.

What's up?

How you doing ? Yeah.

It was really interesting.

'cause everybody knows their last names.

. So Bela, so oh, goes.

So do you so then you grew up here?

Yeah, I grew up here I lived in Santa Monica from 0 to 5 and then I

moved to Agoura Hills First grade.

Oh, so a true Cali native Definitely.

Yeah, but yeah, my first language was Spanish though.

My mom does not like to speak English?

. Oh, but she know, she knows English.

She does, but she doesn't like to speak it.

Yeah, she, it's a native language.

Yeah.

So she came here when she was 22 yeah.

Yeah, so I grew up speaking Spanish the first five years.

. And I don't know how I learned English, but my mom says through.

the television.

Figuring it out.

You learned english through tv?

Yup.

Is that is that what inspired you to become a certain acting?

Oh, no.

My career started as a dancer.

I was a dance.

Oh let's back up.

Okay.

Wait a minute.

Let's back it up then.

So you.

Originally went to college for dancing.

Yes, which that was a dancer myself, which form of dancing were you style?

It was it's it was called modern dance.

Now.

I believe it's called lyrical.

So it's Martha Graham Are I kid?

I'll be honest.

I am a little envious I can You guys are so smart and like interesting

with those types of dances.

I did I was a breakdancer.

Oh Yeah for us.

We're like, all right, is it fast and does it look cool?

All right, that's it.

That's all Yeah, so much thought and that goes into oh definitely Alvin

Ailey's we all aspire out to be like Yeah, work for Alvin Ailey kind of thing.

Yeah, so so what made you want to really go in for dancing?

You've just been more dancing your life.

Yeah, it's something that I've always been a performer since I was a little

girl So yeah, I just never my parents didn't know anything about the acting

or theater world I think if they had or if I had known I probably would

have gotten involved a little bit more but No, it was much more dance.

It was And your parents were very supportive of your dancing?

No.

What did they, what do they want you?

They wanted me to be a nurse or a doctor.

We always, we we have an interesting track record on the show, which

we get a lot when people say, Oh, their parents don't want them to do

exactly what they ended up doing.

What for you was like, Oh when did you tell them like,

okay, I'm going for dancing?

What was the conversation like telling your parents?

Hey, I'm not going to do what you want.

I'm going to do what I want.

I ended up doing what they wanted.

Oh, really?

I did because my dad's you're a dime in a bucket.

Your feet are going to turn all ugly.

He goes, What are your ambitions?

Esther?

He goes, do you want to own a ballet studio?

So I ended up switching my major in the middle of college.

Oh, but you originally went for dancing, you switched.

Yeah, I switched.

But I still, I loved it.

Something's still so much part of me.

So I ended up getting, becoming a Spanish major out of all things.

And then I got my teaching credential.

So awesome because when you're that's you're like your native language, man

College and you became a Spanish teacher.

Is that what you're saying?

No, I actually in those days We had bilingual education here in the state

of California They were handing keys to people yeah, if you could speak English

and Spanish you're like, oh great.

Yeah, nice.

Yeah So I was going to, I was going to night school to get my credential.

And I was teaching third grade in Spanish, hearing third grade in Spanish.

Oh, wow.

We used to live in Canoga park.

Yeah.

That's what that's actually me and Nicholas were roommates first in Canoga

park before we moved to where we live now.

And speaking of Canoga park real quick, this is not a plug.

We are not affiliated with these people, but I got to shout them out.

You ever been a bowl and burger over there?

Oh.

Absolutely incredible.

My goodness.

Bowl and burger, I'm just saying it makes me hungry.

It's this like fusion between Asian food and Hispanic food.

Wow.

And they actually do it right.

Yeah.

It's crazy.

They have these teriyaki burritos.

Awesome.

Teriyaki burritos.

Yeah!

That's good.

Yeah!

It's great.

And then, so you graduated college.

Where did you go to college?

UCLA.

UCLA.

UCLA.

So you graduated from UCLA, and where did you go from there?

Then I went, I literally graduated in June.

I got married in August.

Where did you meet your husband?

At a church picnic.

That's it.

That's it.

That is awesome.

Yeah.

Yes.

That's like very that's like humble, very humble beginnings.

How long did you, let me ask you something.

Did he pick up most of the chairs by himself?

Is that what all the chairs, he got eight of them.

Volleyball against each other.

He had just immigrated to this country.

Cause he's from Argentina.

Oh, also a Spanish speaker.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, he was born and raised there.

So he came here At that time in life.

Oh, awesome.

Awesome So then where did you pick up the acting bug then did

it come from your love of dancing?

Okay, so then we have to fast forward.

Oh now we're fast forwarding have to fast forward.

Okay, how many years?

Just let's just say enough just enough.

Yeah, I had three children we were so it all started with It's tough because

you get married, you have, I worked a little bit as a teacher and then I had

three boys literally two years apart.

And but like anything, if you are, I'm just a creative person I have always been,

since I was a little girl, just put on the shelf to put on a role of, being a mom.

A wife and raising my three boys.

And so they all play soccer.

So we're huge soccer.

Who's your team?

For what?

For futbol.

Oh, futbol.

Oh, my gosh.

Argentina, por supuesto, right?

Yeah.

You can't get away from that, from Messi, right?

Yeah.

My husband is Rosarito.

He's from Rosario.

Oh, Messi's so good.

Yeah.

And they were born in the same hospital.

Really?

Yes, Messi and my husband.

That's so cool.

Yeah, I always ask, are you related to him?

He goes, no, not really.

He just got paid like a billion dollars by Saudi to They want him

over in Saudi or something like that.

Whether he does it or not is Oh, he hasn't decided?

No, he's at Miami.

Yeah.

He's under Beckham.

David Beckham.

Did you ever think that because he have you been to Argentina?

Yes.

So you went with like your husband and your boys to visit?

Yeah.

We went when we first got married many years ago, and then we just

went in 2019 right before COVID.

Lucky break guys.

2020.

Lucky break.

Yeah.

Hindsight.

I hate even saying this hindsight is 2020.

It was like, that's the year.

What?

At the same time, did you Because your family's also from South America.

Did you spend that time also going over there possibly?

They're from El Salvador.

Oh, they're from El Salvador.

They're Central America.

Growing up I did go, but once the Civil War happened, we stopped going.

Oh, so because the Civil War really took a toll on El Salvador.

But it's changed now and I do want to go because we have a new

president and they, he's cracking down on those people down there.

Yeah, I saw that in the news.

He's his approval rating is like.

Yeah, Bukele, yeah.

Bukele, yeah.

And then the venture into acting.

Oh yeah, so we have to go back.

Sorry, we go on tangency.

We talked about Messi, we're like, let's talk about Messi.

No, so we played soccer and there was there was one of the parents

on the team is Nolan North.

And I remember he he would always make these crazy like voices.

And then I found out he's a very well known voiceover actor Yeah, and very

well known and his son and my son Lucas played together And so anyways, we just

started talking and then I'm like, wow, you know They'll be really interesting.

I just thought myself.

Maybe I should do voiceover work like do audiobooks, right?

So I ended up going I asked him for a reference to take a class I went to

a class a voiceover class and then lo and behold I took the voiceover class

and I figured out The ones that were doing well were act, were actors.

They were trained actors.

So it led to one thing.

I'm like, Oh, I told my husband, you know what, I really should

take acting classes if I really want to get better at voiceovers.

And that's how I started.

How did your husband feel about you becoming an actor?

He thought I was having some crisis.

At least at first he thought it was just something, Did think it

came outta the blue or something.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He, even to this day a lot of things have been coming into play.

. But just 'cause I've been doing it for nine years now.

Nine years consistently, nine years like, like doing the work.

That's awesome.

Like training and a lot of people, a lot of people don't realize how much

time and effort it takes to really bring out a really great performance.

Oh, definitely.

Like all good acting teachers, you're an instrument.

And if you, one of the acting teachers, he says, you cannot just say, Oh,

I want to be a concerto pianist.

That doesn't happen overnight.

You need to train.

You need to do You might be one of those lucky people.

You might be one of those lucky people that, you know, whatever, but Ninety 99.

9 percent of us.

Oh, 99.

9 percent of them.

We have to work.

Yeah.

We have to prepare.

The leap from royal paint is, was in the same situation.

So it was like a stay at home dad.

And he was like, yeah, let me try it.

Let me act and let me do this.

And yeah I don't know the complete story, but that's, it was similar to your

situation where he was like, Doing the family thing and then Lo and behold, he

was one of the lucky ones to yeah, it was interesting I was when I got when I went

to start when I started acting school.

I thought this is so Different and But I loved it.

I love that creative process that just attracted me.

I mean I couldn't go back to dancing, you know after 25 your body's done.

You can't do it You just can't do that, yeah, I, it's funny, I tell you what, I

went to, I used to be a pro breakdancer.

Then I was like, oh, cool, show me something.

I'm like, I'm not that young.

Are you insane?

Also, no I, my knees don't work like they used to.

Exactly.

My elbows don't work like they used to, exactly, yeah, I used to do split leaps

across the room and fly across the room.

I'm like, you can do that when you're young, not, yeah, I remember

when I was talking to my dad.

Young person?

Yeah.

Yeah, I was talking to my dad when I was a pro break dancer and he was like

it's good because I was Like 19 I was like 18 19 so he was like it's good

that you're doing this now because once you hit like your mid 20s like that's

it and I was like What do you mean?

That's it?

You're like, oh your knees will just decide hey, you know what?

It's time and It's funny because I actually fractured my wrist

a whole bunch doing hand hops like whatever breakdancing.

You're gonna break something Oh, I know, but I mean I have a really

good friend and she's 31 and she's you know She's in the show in Vegas

and she still can move and dance.

I know Some people can push it.

That's just training.

Yeah.

Yeah, they can push their body that way but She parries dearly

for us sometimes, it takes training to do all that kind of thing.

So just like you said then with acting, it takes then training to put in those hours.

Oh, yes.

Put in that work.

Yes.

Especially when it comes to bringing different characters to life.

Do you ever find yourself taking a character home with you?

That is something that I did a couple years ago, and I think

lately I'm like, Learning how to turn it on and off like a faucet.

And how did you find out how to do that?

It takes time and a little bit of knowing yourself and being generous with it.

But being able, it's like anything, it's you have to put a gear on.

You put gloves on, you're ready to go do whatever it is that you need to do.

And then you take them off.

And you reset, because I think you have to be, it just,

everybody has a different process.

I I can't because I've seen it seep through and then it just switches and the

boys were like, what is up with you mom?

I was just about to.

That happened to me like I was working on like a play and stuff and she's more

like, Came from a drug background and things like that So just I was very edgy

and it seeped through when I was with my boys and like you have to And then

my even my husband's okay, that's acting that's not you Esther and I go yeah, I

got it Go back and just really, but it does take, it's a muscle because it's

also when we were more demanded to do very difficult things like high stake

things where it's emotionally charged or something beyond any kind of circumstance

that I would ever be in real life.

You know what I mean?

It does permeate through the day.

Like physically my body's like exhausted.

It's almost like you were dancing.

Yes.

Emotionally.

Yeah.

Emotionally exhausting.

Like it just, it's exhausting.

It's exhausting.

It's it's like anything, if you've ever had anything traumatic happen

in your life and you cry and you cry for half an hour, there's remnants of

that after you done your weeping and your anguish and your screaming or

whatever, there's remnants of that.

And people will say, are you okay?

And you're like, yeah, I'm fine.

Yeah, I'm fine.

You know what I mean?

What do your kids think about you acting?

Oh, it's so funny.

My my, one of my older son, he, I remember we, with my manager, Carla Alexander,

who's, kudos to her she signed me first.

She signed me first, and it was, that's another story how I found her, but the

point being I remember Niko goes, yeah, I asked Carla whether you were good or not.

Did your son Niko?

Yeah, my son, he's is she any good or, and it was just one of those things

like, I love how it's I saw, I see her growth, it's but yeah they love it.

They love seeing me on TV now.

Like I think it's hysterical and they That is pretty cool.

I'm not gonna lie.

If I saw my seeing your mom on tv.

On tv, you'd be like, cool.

Yeah, that's my mom.

She's on tv.

. Yeah.

If it's like a show that's really like big and stuff, they're

like, oh, there's, there she is.

Do you have any specific instances where that was the case where they were like, oh

mom, I didn't know you were on that show.

Oh, because I'm sure they don't even know, like they're sure

they don't know everything.

You auditioned for.

. They don't.

Yeah.

'cause as an addition for a lot of things.

Yeah.

I, yeah.

After, yeah, before the pandemic.

A lot happened then every, not the pandemic, the strikes, and

then boom, everything shut down.

Yeah.

And it's revamping all up again.

Thank God you woo.

Those strikes last year were Yeah.

Pretty intense.

It was intense.

Oh yeah.

It was pretty rough.

We were out there picketing, yeah.

In front of a, we in front a Disney.

Disney.

We were sitting there you know all up in the car's faces

while they were pulling out.

You know what?

Let me ask esther here if this is because you're an actress so imagine that you

just leave The year on set the strike is going on And you know with the way

especially when it first started was just a wga before sag joined in right?

and So if there's a show currently happening, you just have to

finish out the show on contract and then you just leave right?

If you're an actor before SAG joined.

It was just WGA at first.

Yeah.

So imagine you're leaving, you are like, this strike is going

on, but I'm supporting the strike.

Da.

And then some guy with the picket signs.

Like I remember going ah, that's this guy . The thing was, he scared,

like dirty people was so funny.

I was really, I was like upset because when we got there.

Everybody was just standing around just talking to each other.

They were actually earning the awning in like their chairs.

And I was like I thought we were supporting the writers,

I thought we were striking.

I thought we were striking.

And they were all just chilling around, just hanging out.

Just oh look, there's a car right there.

And I was like, I thought we were like, I thought we were upset.

So Nicholas and us, Nicholas and me, we're from the South.

Which people can be very emotional.

You sent them something and they'd be like, Ahh!

Don't you think that would scare you though.

You're supposed to come up to the car, you're supposed to

just watch them on the side.

And I was just like, Hey, what's up?

And I was like, wearing a Yeah, imagine you're leaving the set and

some guy just comes to your window.

You can be like, hey, what's wrong with you?

Yeah.

Yeah.

But this is how upset we were, right?

We're upset, right?

What are we doing just being like, Oh, yeah.

There's that person right there.

There was someone in a rocking chair.

And I was like, and he was like, my age.

He was like, I didn't know he was younger than me.

He was like early 20s.

I was like, bro, at least save it for someone who like, needs it.

We're just chillin over here.

Cause I went up to somebody, I was like, hey, are you upset?

I'm so upset, man.

You know where the water and the food is around here?

I was like, yeah.

We're not here for water and food, man.

The snooby doo treats were dope.

The snooby doo snacks were definitely on point.

My husband was laughing when I he's that's your strike, Esther?

Cause, because of all the goodies.

I'm like, no, these, okay, the goodies come from people who are supporting us.

They're like donating it.

Yeah.

He goes, this is, cause he comes from a country where so much has

happened and strikes have happened.

Cause this is red carpet y.

It's the same way I feel about tailgating.

When you go tailgating out here for college football and you're like,

this is what you guys call tailgating?

It's like a religion down south.

They're like, we're not going to get into that.

Oh, I knew.

My cousin lives in North Carolina and she married.

Oh, it's very uncanny.

Yeah, how I see it's a lifestyle.

It is.

Yeah, that's what it is.

That's what it is If you want to be friends in the south you have to watch

college football Not only that but my dad was like just get a pickup truck

and go to one football game You don't need to go to a whole bunch of them.

You go to, you have a pickup truck, you go to one football game where they can

put the cooler or the grill in the back of your truck, you drive over there.

You're the hero for the next 10 years.

They're like, Oh, you do remember that one time you had a pickup truck?

Yeah.

So go hop from tailgate to tailgate.

Make all friends.

So since you grew up here in California, like in the Hollywood

area and stuff like that.

And then I think it's interesting that your husband's Oh, You want to act?

That's weird.

It's Oh, I thought a lot of people who come on the show they have

quote unquote, always wanted to do those same type of things.

But then you're similar towards actually, I guess someone like myself

where I was like, Oh, this wasn't what I originally thought I would be doing,

and so now that you're on this path, do you possibly see yourself encouraging

some of your family to do it too?

Or what is, what are your other types of things?

No, they're all STEM majors.

They're all, yeah, they're, my husband's an engineer, the other

one's a computer science engineer.

The other two are biotech, bioengineering.

Yeah, but at least you get to flex.

You're like, yeah, I'm an actress.

It was a thing for me.

You know what I mean?

It's something that's always been in me, but it's somehow been maybe suppressed.

Like dormant or something?

No, suppressed.

Suppressed.

Oh.

Suppressed.

Not because it's, not because I put it dormant, because my life

or my outside circumstances.

Oh, required for it to be.

Required to put it, not, this is not something, even to

the point, not something that you should even think about.

or do.

So it was beautiful to have my husband like support me.

And then it comes to a point, I think with any relationship, it's like,

how long is this going to go for?

Are you doing it for real?

Or is it for play?

But he, the other day there was something like look at mommy.

Do you see how she, she goes a hundred percent with all those

no's, but she's still doing it.

It's a point of inspiration.

Yeah.

And then when you book something big, it just or something

happens, you're like, Oh, okay.

Just valid.

Like I'm still on the path.

It's like trying to climb Mount Everest.

How do you keep that motivation going?

Because I love the craft.

True love of the craft.

I love the craft.

I just love the craft.

And I love learning more about myself through this thing.

They say that the more actors play other people, the more they learn

about themselves, which is true.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think you have to face some things that you don't want to, or, and then you

have to bring them out in a performance.

The saying goes that actors ask questions that nobody wants to know the answers to.

Yeah.

Do you think in your experience in acting has made you become a better person?

Yeah.

A better person?

I have, I've always had empathy and generosity and compassion

towards people, of course, yeah.

That's just me kind of thing.

I guess what I meant to say was, do you understand yourself more

now with acting than before?

Yeah, I, these, yeah, the, yeah.

Yes.

Are there any specific instances where you're like, wow, this,

you had like breakthroughs?

Oh, yeah.

For example, that, that privacy, something that is where that having

your own privacy become public, and that's showing vulnerability and we

put on a facade so much and it's.

And it's those kind of moments when that, that somehow seeps through the

character and it's just, it's there.

It's almost like when you do that, it's not, it's like a, it's,

you're not just saying the lines, you're having an experience.

So for other people who might want to change and getting to acting,

what do you have any advice for those people where they, they don't

know how to get started or training?

Like for me personally, when people ask me about.

Cause I do a lot of writing, right?

But I use an Excel sheet to study scripts and other people don't do that.

But that's your science y brain that works.

I'm always like, okay, how many people are in this scene?

Okay.

How many lines do they have?

Okay.

Then it's then what is their emotional change?

Okay.

How does that affect the rest of the script?

I have a pluses and minuses and stuff like that.

That's fascinating.

Yeah.

So when cause that's a visual thing.

Yeah, I have to see the numbers for me personally to get it.

Yeah, you can even graph that.

Yeah.

Graph it.

That's very fascinating.

Yeah, so when it comes to acting, do you have any advice on training?

Oh train.

And is it just train by doing?

No it's like going to the gym.

Yeah.

Don't go to the gym to watch people work out, go to the gym and work out.

It's, and you ha I think there's so many schools and different kinds of things.

And I think you just have to find the right fit.

Just like you have to find the right coach.

If you were, a pro athlete, find somebody that works for you.

Pushes you but works with you, but is encouraging and hard at the same

time, you know there's no right way.

But yeah, I would encourage anybody to begin At a school wherever that may be

and if you don't then do theater Right now there's so many zoom online classes

beautiful wonderful online classes.

You can start acting the world's has changed I'm like when I even nine years

ago when I started I'm like There's no such thing as taking acting class via

zoom, I would have never thought of that.

Like for real.

I only didn't know what zoom was until 2020.

I knew skype.

Everyone knew skype.

And I was like, Skype didn't go away?

Was Skype eaten by Zoom?

Yeah, I don't know what happened, why Skype didn't become

the dominant thing in Zoom.

Anyway, the only thing I have in my mind, I'm like, it's probably because Zoom

probably pitched to the education center.

Schools and stuff like that.

And then, what's people doing in schools?

You just gotta go everywhere.

But it's been such great having you on the show.

It's been really great.

Oh, thank you.

Yeah is there anywhere people can follow you?

Oh, yeah, on my Instagram page.

Yeah, my Instagram, it's at the E T Y P I D A L, at, I don't know, it's, yeah,

my handle, it's at E T Y P I D A L, yeah.

Dope.

It's great having you on the show.

Guys, this has been Film Center News.

My name is Derek Johnson II.

I'm Nicholas Killian.

And we're here with the great Esther Pidal.

And we'll see you next time.

See you.

This has been Film Center on Comic-Con Radio.

Check out our previous episodes at Comic-Con radio.com.

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