Villa Alegre

I too, like David am amazed to see the affection for our little show Villa Alegre. I am Joaquin, and played Francisco on the show for 4 years.

After reading all of your posts, I now realize what a big influence our show had at the time. I cannot express to you how great that makes me feel.

I have read so many questions on your posts, and welcome the opportunity to answer them the best that I can (we are talking almost 30 years here!) I too think there is plenty of opportunity for shows like this, especially on newer networks like SiTV and such who really promote our ethnic cultures. I really believe that our show (among others) paved the way for popular "bilingual" shows such as Dora the Explorer, Diego, and Maya & Miguel. (I have a toddler, can you tell?) I actually wish that a show such as Villa Alegre was airing today, because my daughter is growing up bilingual, and this would be a great asset in her learning.

One post mentioned that there was no "actors of prominence" on the show. I can tell you that this statement is simply not true. We were kids then, and all grew up. If you look up all of the actors (including me), you will find many, many credits to their names. Most went on to do many other things, including blockbuster movies, and huge television hits.

Thank you all for remembering this show! Joaquin Garay III "Francisco"

For about 20 years no one I talked to could tell me the name of this spanish show that came on PBS untill I posted the question at The Toonarific Archive.Within a day ,a fellow user gave me a link to Yesterdayland that told about the show and how it was railroaded off the air by THE CHILDRENS TELEVISION WORK SHOP OF ALL COMPANIES!! Turns out,they didnt want ANY competition for the spanish speaking public so they sought to have their funding removed.Eventually they won in 1980 and the show was cancelled.There was also some bickering as to which of the spanish speaking comunities would have the greatest influence(Cuban,Mexican,S.American,Spanish,).It really bothered me to hear about the troubles behind the scenes that the show had.Shame on you Big Bird!

Hola, Amigos...de Villa Alegre...la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la la-la-la...Villa Alegre! Born in Puerto Rico 37 years ago. In the 1970's, I'd come running home from school to watch "Villa Alegre" on PBS. An only child raised by my grandparents, there weren't other kids around to talk to. I spoke English at school and Spanish at home. "Villa Alegre" helped me make sense of that duality. I adopted Villa Alegre as MY community, MY bilingual neighborhood. I moved to the US at 17. "Villa Alegre" prepared me to understand in my own skin and heart what it means to be a Latina in a multicultural society. Whereas "Sesame Street" gave me the NYC perspective of my own immigrant family, "Villa Alegre" blessed me with something completely new and beyond my litte world. Hussssshh...I still sing the uplifting theme song in the shower and in my car. Thank you, Villa Alegre, gracias! You will always be a part of me. Does anyone know where I can find that beautiful song?

It's always amazing to me to find others have actually seen this show because, like the writer of the above comment, I never found anything on it on the web. Not even YouTube has any clips :( I loved this show and have very fond early childhood memories of the opening credits with the miniature amusement park/fair rides. The theme song still sticks in my head every time I say or type the show's title. I wonder why it's so hard to find footage of this show if other 70's shows were recorded. I just went on YouTube and found clips of every 70's children show I could think of. There are even multiple pages of clips from another favorite of mine, "Vegetable Soup" - also a diversity-themed children's show from that seemingly Utopian time of creativity in that arena.

It was a pleasant surprise to find residual interest in a children's program show that was aired in the 70's. I was involved in the production of the Villa Alegre television programs until the end of production. My father was the executive producer of the shows, and I was the last Line Producer of the Villa Alegre program. I noticed one cast member registered remarks on this web sight, that was nice. It was great to hear the feedback. In reviewing some of the comments, it appears the thematic curriculum, and the music caught the interest of the viewers, most importantly the bilingual programming and also some folks addressed the characters in the shows. It's important to note that some of the characters in the shows were caricatures of real people who lived in real barrios. The creator of the program introduced these folks through vision and characterizations. Many themes were introduced in the shows, i.e. natural environment, nutrition, self and others, etc.

I believe the shows had merit and brought forth issues ever present in multicultural societies and given the current growth of the Latino population such children's programming should be revisited.

The shows still have a viable heartbeat and breath and it will be interesting to evaluate these again if there is an interest in airing them again. Anyone is invited to send comments if they wish. I will make an attempt to reply if possible.

I thought the television series was wonderful; but then again, I was a production team member and may be biased in my opinion.