Career

CarOlé Flamenco is a fifth-generation flamenco and Spanish dancer (classical, regional, contemporary) of Gitana, Spanish, Afro-Latina, Yaqui, Sephardic Jewish, Mexican, and Irish heritage. A union actor, stand-up comedian, singer, choreographer, published author, and Master of Fine Arts candidate, she is the director and principal artist of CarOlé Flamenco’s Compañía FSDT, the oldest flamenco and Spanish dance theatre company in the Americas. A professional since fourteen, working in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and beyond, her credits include a principal role in the feature film Meisner, directed by Jim Parrack; and voice and percussion recordings for Lucasfilm. At The San Francisco Dungeon (Merlin Entertainments), she was a lead actor, playing all the roles. In concert, she partnered with Antonio Vargas, a highly regarded flamenco dancer and principal actor in the film Strictly Ballroom, and appeared as a soloist alongside him. She has also performed as a soloist and choreographed with symphonies and operas, including Shanghai Opera. As a stand-up comedian, she has played many comedy clubs, including the Punch Line Comedy Club and Caroline’s in New York. Highlights: “Top Flamenco Dancer in America” (So You Think You Can Dance); Isadora Duncan Dance Award nominee; selected dancer, Battle of the Dance; hand-selected by Jennifer Lopez for ¡Qué Viva! The Chosen. CarOlé is a yogi, Transcendental Meditation practitioner, liberated sage, and is completing her ISMETA-approved certification to be a somatics practitioner. She is currently creating her one-person show. Her work takes on oppression and reaches toward liberation: survivance, preservation, evolution. caroleflamenco.com

CarOlé is a two-spirit, ambidextrous feminist, a survivor of rape, domestic violence, and cancer, an advocate for people with invisible disabilities, living with C-PTSD herself, her life full and contented. During her childhood and teen years, even though there was hardship, she skipped a grade in school and was named class clown twice. Through her work, people of all ages come to know resilience, like the lotus emerging out of the mud.

Lineages

The legacy began in 1894, at home, in family and community, passed mother to daughter for five generations: Domitila, Romelia, Dora, her mother Carolina Lugo, and CarOlé Flamenco. Carolina was the first in the family to receive formal training and turn professional, with that path beginning at seven, when Antonio Triana hand-selected her to train, on full scholarship. Gene Kelly later chose her as his private protégée. At fourteen, Carolina was chosen by Lola Montes for her professional company, to tour as a soloist and principal artist worldwide. Lola had toured internationally in the company of flamenco legend Carmen Amaya before forming her own. At seventeen, Carolina was struck by a bus and told she would never walk again; she returned to dance professionally and toured five more seasons with Lola’s company. In 1995 the company lineage passed to Carolina in succession, and she has carried it forward ever since. Years later, Gino D’Auri, a renowned flamenco guitarist who had toured with Lola’s company alongside Carolina, saw the inner fire in CarOlé and brought her to the attention of Pepa Montes in Sevilla, who chose her as her private protégée, placing her in the lineage of Pastora Imperio and Matilde Coral. As an actor, she was selected by Jim Jarrett, Sanford Meisner’s last teaching protégée, to carry the Meisner lineage forward. Meisner came out of Stanislavski’s system alongside Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler, and created a technique entirely his own — a great contribution to American theatre and film acting. CarOlé now carries all of these lineages forward, and Compañía FSDT is their reflection — in performance and in teaching.

Additional Flamenco Training

CarOlé has also studied flamenco with El Torombo, Farruquito, Esperanza Fernández, Jesús Montoya, Concha Vargas, Manuel Betanzos, Cristian Almodóvar, Lola Montes, and Rosa Montoya, among others.