Frankie J. Alvarez

Alvarez's parents are originally from Cuba, his father from Havana, and his mother from Artemisa. He is first-generation American and was born and raised in Miami, Florida. Alvarez grew up with the arts in his family: his grandmother was an opera singer in Cuba, while his father played music in a band in Puerto Rico, his mother was a ballerina, and his three sisters all performed in the Miami City Ballet. Spanish was his first language, and he did not learn English until he was 7 or 8 years old, stating that he started learning English from watching baseball. He then graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts and moved to New York City, and was encouraged by a friend to apply to Juilliard School. He used a bilingual version of the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet for his callback and was accepted into the program and received the Raul Julia Memorial Scholarship. He graduated from Juilliard in 2010. ==Acting career==

Stage While attending Juilliard, Alvarez trained at the Chautauqua Theater Company, appearing as Bernard in Death of a Salesman and Puck in ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' in 2008. Alvarez portrayed the titular character in Brain Trust Production's The Tragedie of Cardenio at the 2010 Midtown International Theatre Festival, for which he won the award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Play. After graduating from school, Alvarez performed in regional theater, landing his first professional acting role in a national tour production of Ramona Quimby, based on the popular children's book series. His performances at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival resulted in his recruitment to Asolo Repertory Theatre, where he received praise for his lead role of Hamlet in the theatre's production of Hamlet: Prince of Cuba, a Spanish and English-language adaptation of the Shakespeare play reset in 19th century Havana. The play was translated into Spanish by Nilo Cruz and Alvarez studied the play for almost a year and learned to perform it in both Spanish and English. He and friend Gabriel Ebert collaborated on the musical Those Lost Boys, about the one-night-only 10 year reunion of a rockstar band, which was developed and premiered at the 2013 Ars Nova All New Talent Fest and headlined the Ars Nova All New Talent Fest again in 2014. Television Alvarez appeared as a recurring minor role on the NBC television show Smash before landing his first major television role was the 2014 HBO series Looking as the main character Agustín, alongside co-stars Jonathan Groff and Murray Bartlett. Audio book narration Alvarez is also an audiobook narrator, appearing on the Oregon Shakespeare Festival's audio recording of Measure for Measure, and narrating audiobook works such as Héctor Tobar's The Barbarian Nurseries, Justin Torres's We the Animals, and Sebastian Rotella's Triple Crossing. ==Accolades==

While attending Juilliard, Alvarez was the recipient of the prestigious Raul Julia Memorial Scholarship. In 2010, his performance in The Tragedie of Cardenio by Ben Bartolone earned him the Midtown International Theatre Festival's award for "Outstanding Lead Actor in a Play". His performance as Agustín in Looking also earned him a nomination for the Imagen Foundation Award's "Best Supporting Actor" in 2014. ==Personal life==

Alvarez met his wife, Leah Walsh, as a first year student while both attended Juilliard, his wife a second year student. They married in May 2013. Walsh is also an actress and the couple live together in Astoria, Queens in New York City. They have two daughters == Filmography ==

Film Television Theatre Audiobooks ==Notes==