Tony Plana

José Antonio Plana was born on April 19, 1952, in Havana, Cuba. His family relocated to Miami in 1960. He completed his undergraduate education at Loyola Marymount University and received his acting training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London.

Plana's stage career spans the Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and New York City theater communities. His Broadway work ran from 1979 to 1985 and included productions of Zoot Suit and The Boys of Winter. He originated the role of Rudy in Luis Valdez's Zoot Suit during its Los Angeles run and subsequently reprised the role in the film adaptation. In 1995, Plana founded East L.A. Classic Theatre, through which he created and directed Shakespeare productions for minority audiences over the course of a decade. His stage work has also included appearances at New York City's Public Theater.

On television, Plana is widely recognized for portraying Ignacio Suarez, the father of Betty Suarez, on the ABC series Ugly Betty. His other television credits include Hill Street Blues, Cagney & Lacey, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, The West Wing, 24, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Commander in Chief, and Resurrection Boulevard. In 2011, he guest starred on Desperate Housewives as Alejandro Perez, Gabrielle Solis's abusive stepfather, and directed the episode Witch's Lament during the show's eighth season. That same year he appeared in an episode of Body of Proof and participated in the web series Los Americans, centered on a middle-class Los Angeles family.

His film credits include An Officer and a Gentleman, Three Amigos, Lone Star, and Goal. PC gamers know Plana as the voice of Manuel "Manny" Calavera in LucasArts' 1998 adventure game Grim Fandango, a role he revisited with El Cardenal in Ghost Recon Wildlands in 2017. He also served as narrator for the 2003 production Cuba Libre and performed in a radio adaptation of John Hersey's Hiroshima that same year.

Beyond performing and directing, Plana teaches acting at California State University, Dominguez Hills and Rio Hondo College. He volunteers as a spokesperson for comprehensive immigration reform and delivered the keynote address at the 2012 LULAC conference held at the Coronado Springs Convention Center in Lake Buena Vista, Florida. In 2012, he also served as a judge for the Noor Iranian Film Festival.