By ElTeatroCampesino.com – Photo Jay Thompson/Center Theater Group
On Tuesday, Jan. 31, a revival of “Zoot Suit” begins its run at the Taper, kicking off the theater’s 50th-anniversary season. A fantastical reimagining of the so-called Sleepy Lagoon murder case, in which 12 Latino youths were unjustly convicted by a biased judge, “Zoot Suit” features racist prosecutors and lovelorn kids, lively swing tunes and family squabbles. The infamous Zoot Suit riots, a series of racially motivated attacks against Mexican-American youths in the summer of 1943, figures in as well.