Los Vendidos (Spanish for The Sold Ones or The Sellouts) is a one-act play by Chicano playwright Luis Valdez, a founding member of El Teatro Campesino.
The action of the play revolves around "The Secretary", a character by the name of Miss Jiménez, who converses with Honest Sancho, the owner of the store.
Sancho says her name with Spanish pronunciation ([xiˈmenes] or, roughly, hee-MEN-ess), though she chastises him for speaking bad English, demanding that it be pronounced as the Anglicized /ˈdʒɪmənɛz/ JIM-ə-nez.
Miss Jiménez explains to the courteous Honest Sancho that she is a secretary for Governor Reagan and that his administration is looking to purchase "a Mexican type" to appeal to a lower income crowd.
Sancho shows the Secretary four different models, snapping his fingers in order to bring them to life and demonstrate their behaviors.
Although Miss Jiménez is herself evidently a Chicana (Mexican-American), she seems completely ignorant to the cultural stereotypes displayed in each of the four buyable characters.
Second, they examine the "Johnny Pachuco", a 1950s Chicano gang member model who is violent, profane, and drug-abusing, though an easy scapegoat and perfect to brutalize.
Third, when Miss Jiménez asks for a more romantic model, they come to the Revolucionario, one of the glorified bandit/martyrs of early Californian history; however, she denies him when she learns that he is completely Mexican and not even American-made.
Finally, they come to the most contemporary Mexican-American model, named "Eric Garcia": a well-dressed and exciting public speaker who is university-educated, ambitious, bilingual, and polite.
Miss Jiménez very reluctantly agrees to buy Eric for $15,000, when suddenly he begins staging a vocal protest in Spanish: "¡Viva la raza!
One of the supporting actors then brings out a map showcasing the different areas in America in which similar infiltrations are taking place.
The special ultimately ends with a cutback to Luiz Valdezon the pyramid as he explains his view of“the universal life of the Chicano” (Los Vendidos 23:16) [2] Espinosa, Kristin E., and Douglas S. Massey.