From the Lab to the Limelight
By day, Vanessa Orozco ’20 parses regulations and reviews applications as a certification specialist for California Certified Organic Farmers. By night, she trades spreadsheets for the spotlight, bringing theater productions to life on stage.
It might sound like two separate worlds. But for Vanessa, they’re two sides of the same yellow brick road, both rooted in getting to the heart of what matters.
Vanessa once imagined theater would remain a fond memory. Instead, her life has unfolded in two simultaneous acts: lab reports and line readings, data analysis and dress rehearsals.
And somehow, neither feels like a compromise.
Vanessa Orozco ’20
Educating the Whole Person
Vanessa’s most important takeaway from Santa Clara wasn’t a stage credit. In fact, she put theater on the back burner to focus on her studies. She points instead to something less visible.
“I think Santa Clara gave me a really good foundation for how to process information, and how to develop an opinion,” she says. “Critical thinking is a very important skill to have, and that’s definitely the biggest thing that Santa Clara gave me.”
In Dr. Katherine Saxton’s biology lab, Vanessa learned how to process dense material, to slow down and sit with complexity. Being trusted with complicated topics taught her that she could understand them, write about them, and present them.
Science and theater may feel like black-and-white versus Technicolor, but Vanessa uses the same skill set to process scientific research and unpack a character's motivations.
Today, she approaches scripts using the critical thinking she refined in her labs. What is the playwright really saying? What motivates this character? What is the best way to convey that on stage?
A Thing of the Past
With the rest of the class of 2020, Vanessa graduated into a world that felt suspended.
Nobody was auditioning. Nobody was performing. The spotlight had gone dark.
But in 2022, after more than five years away from the theater, Vanessa walked into the audition room again. There, she reconnected with “Somewhere Over the Border” director Carlos Mendoza, whom she originally met performing with San Diego Junior Theatre.
Since then, Vanessa has balanced her science career with evening rehearsals, rediscovering a part of herself she thought she might have left behind, no ruby slippers required.
“Somewhere Over the Border” star Vanessa Orozco ’20 in the rehearsal room with Cygnet Theatre’s Marketing & Communications Specialist (and fellow Bronco!) Joel Ellazar ’00.
Off to See the Wizard
Now, she’s working with Carlos at Cygnet Theatre in San Diego to bring “Somewhere Over the Border” to life.
Inspired by the journey of playwright Brian Quijada’s mother from El Salvador to the United States, the musical weaves magical realism and imagery from “The Wizard of Oz” into a story about immigration, identity, and belonging.
When Vanessa first read the script, one song in particular caught her attention. In “Life in America,” a young mother arrives in the United States expecting a perfect life, only to discover the reality is far more complicated.
The honesty of the intersection of hope and heartbreak stayed with Vanessa, and clarified why this story matters now.
“Sometimes what you need to do, to get to the heart of things, is see a story,” she says
She doesn’t want audiences to see her performing. She wants them to see themselves, their mothers, their grandparents, their neighbors.
Because sometimes empathy begins in the dark, in a room full of strangers, living a story together.
Making Space
Helping to bring a new work to life makes the process special. Unlike a long-established show with decades of performance history, this production is still being shaped. She feels a sense of responsibility and an awareness that choices made in rehearsal may define how audiences connect with the story.
There’s another layer of magic for Vanessa: Somewhere Over the Border is being staged in The Joan, a new performance space at Cygnet Theatre.
In a time when arts spaces often struggle to survive, it’s rare to christen a new stage with a new production, and rarer still for that production to feel so timely.
Vanessa on stage with “Somewhere Over the Border” co-star Crissy Guerrero.
Off to See the Wizard
Even as she pours herself into the creative process, Vanessa remains grounded in her parallel career in science. Balancing both worlds can be a grind: early mornings, late rehearsals, careful scheduling.
It’s not always glamorous. But it is fulfilling.
Looking ahead, she hopes to spend a few years in New York City, either taking in the shows or acting in them, and soaking up the life experience that comes with living somewhere new.
After that, she imagines returning to San Diego’s theater community, bringing everything she’s learned back home.
Her path hasn’t been linear. It hasn’t been predictable. And there may not be a single Emerald City waiting for her.
But wherever her road winds next, Vanessa will walk it with a Bronco’s best tools: brains, heart, and courage.
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Performances of “Somewhere Over the Border” run through March 15 at Cygnet Theatre in San Diego.
The cast and crew of “Somewhere Over the Border” at Cygnet Theatre in San Diego, CA.
Photos courtesy of Cygnet Theatre and Karli Cadel Photography.