Richard Mendoza III

Richard Mendoza III was born in 1996 in San Diego California to Richard Jr. and Kimberlee. He had endless amounts of fun with his brother Ethan, holding back zombie invasions, and taking harrowing expeditions into uncharted galaxies.

 

Growing up, Richard rallied his friends together in epic roleplaying sessions reenacting his favorite movies or having school-wide lightsaber fights. At the time, his father introduced him to strategy games as well, and cemented Risk as his favorite board game of all time. However, the true love of Risk came down to setting up the hundreds of piecing and pretending the toys were fighting a large-scale battle.

 

Richard was in no way a stranger to the imagination, and always found ways to create stories by making scrapbook comics, and writing Halo and Star Wars fan fiction. By the time he was in the sixth grade, he was working on a novel and competing in writing, acting, and dance competitions. His book chapter for Desert of Color made it to the top 20 of the AG National Fine Arts Competition of 2008. The book was never finished, but his desire for storytelling only grew.

 

It was then that he found his love for theatre, traveling with acting troupes, and performing at drug rehab centers and churches. In 2010, he formed Fuego Dance Crew with Eric Payan and Tavonte Brown, an international dance troupe that has been televised on World of Dance.

 

In 2011, Richard auditioned and was accepted to the San Diego School of Performing and Creative Arts, where he majored in theatre. He performed in over a dozen productions there, while also honing his craft as a performer.

 

In 2015, he began his career as a professional actor, mentored by casting director Samuel Warren. However, he grew to love his time with board games the most. This same year, his friends introduced him to the game of Dungeons and Dragons, where he discovered the perfect blend of his love for acting and writing. In 2016, he wrote his first homebrew campaign set in a dystopian world of superpowers.

 

Richard graduated from San Diego Christian College with an AA in Liberal Arts, and a BA in Communications. He then pursued and graduated with his MFA in Writing from Lindenwood University.

 

Today, Richard Mendoza III lives with his wife, Madeline, in Lubbock Texas. He is a freelance writer, voice actor, and instructor.