In the high desert basin now known as Anza Valley, a killing in the early 1880s sent shockwaves far beyond the Cahuilla community it devastated. The crime inspired a novel, a play, and generations of mythmaking that often eclipsed the real woman at its core. Now, that long-shadowed tragedy turns to the screen in Ramona and the Ballad of Juan Diego, a new documentary premiering Jan. 3 during Palm Springs International Film Festival with additional screenings Jan. 4 and 10.
Produced by husband-and-wife team Jason and Tawney Sklaver and written and directed by Jason, the project retraces the real-life murder of Juan Diego by Sam Temple, a white settler from San Jacinto. The idea emerged after the Sklavers traveled to Hemet to see Ramona, the century-old outdoor play inspired by Diego’s death and its effect on his community and his wife, Ramona Lubo. Long known as The Ramona Pageant and The Ramona Outdoor Play, it holds the distinction of being the longest-running production in the United States.
Jason, whose previous work includes the documentaries Escaping the Prophet (2014) and Vice Versa: Fear of a Black Quarterback (2021), became fascinated by Diego and Ramona’s story and began researching it, quickly realizing that the play was only the beginning.
The Ramona Bowl Amphitheatre from above during a performance.
“When we started digging into the history, it just kept getting deeper and deeper,” he says. “It was like Russian dolls — a story within a story within a story.”
Much of Juan Diego’s life is undocumented, but what is known is tragic. A sheep shearer living with Lubo and their children near Anza Valley, he struggled with mental health challenges that sometimes led to disorientation — rounding up the wrong sheep or, in one alleged instance, attempting to saddle a tree stump.
One evening in 1883, reportedly in the throes of one of his spells, Diego rode home not on his own horse, but on Temple’s.
“Temple was known to be a bully,” says Eli Santana, the actor who plays the fictional version of Diego in Ramona and appears in the Sklavers’ documentary.
Duane Minard, Rafael Ojeda, and Santana rehearsing at Mission San Juan Capistrano.
Temple tracked Diego down, and from there, accounts begin to differ. According to Lubo, who witnessed the killing, Temple shot an unarmed Diego in the chest, then broke the barrel of his gun over Diego’s head as he lay bleeding on the ground, and fired a final shot to his face.
Temple claimed that Diego approached him with a knife and that he acted in self-defense.
Ramona’s version of events was never heard in court — Temple was tried by an all-white jury, some of whom were his friends. Native American women were rarely permitted to testify. Temple was released, and the killing ruled justifiable.
“It’s a story that reverberates to the modern day,” Jason says. “These are the same sort of stories that have been going on forever, especially in this country. Juan Diego was the victim of bigotry and hatred. This guy didn’t like him and decided … he would viciously and brutally murder Juan Diego. He went to trial, and he got off scot-free.”
The story might have ended there, if not for Helen Hunt Jackson. A prominent writer and early advocate for Native American rights, Jackson encountered Diego’s story and responded with her 1884 novel, Ramona. Inspired by the account of the murder, she reimagined Diego as the character Alessandro, with Ramona rendered a composite character.
The book was an immediate hit. In 1923, it was adapted into Ramona, the outdoor play that soon became a community institution. Tourists flocked to the region to visit the sites where the tale unfolded, and the production took on a life of its own.
By all accounts, Jackson’s intent was to draw attention to injustices faced by Native Americans like Diego. But for Ramona’s descendants, the novel and its mythology obscured their grief by fictionalizing it.
Alice Holmes, Ramona’s great-granddaughter and a participant in the documentary, says her family has boycotted the play for generations.
“My family, we’ve been quiet,” she says. “We’ve never really shared our pain with anyone. None of us have attended The Ramona Pageant … out of respect and honoring my great-grandmother and my grandfather, their pain, and that generational trauma.”
As the Sklavers dug into the history behind the novel and the play, Ramona’s story struck them as an example of the many ways settlers displaced, silenced, and brutalized Native tribes.
“The story of Ramona is really the story of California, and Southern California in particular,” Jason says. “It is the embodiment of everything that happened around the time that California became a state.”
What surprised them most was how thoroughly the factual account had been obscured. “When the phenomenon of the novel and the play started, it was all about this fictional story,” Tawney says. “It’s never really been told — the real history and the real story.”
Their research grew into a yearslong effort. They made repeated trips from Los Angeles to the desert, hiked through the surrounding mountains to pinpoint where Diego was killed, pored through archival recordings and documents, and consulted with representatives from the Autry Museum and other regional organizations to sort through the historical record. The Sklavers also collaborated closely with the Cahuilla Band of Indians and the Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians.
One of their key partners was the late Steve Alvarez, who played a prominent role in Ramona as leader of the Red Tail Spirit Singers and Dancers, the group that performs tribal dances during the production.
“Steve was instrumental in connecting us with members of the Cahuilla,” Jason says.
The film also follows a personal thread: actor Eli Santana’s search for his own Native American ancestry. Santana, who performs in a punk band in addition to portraying Alessandro in Ramona, says he knew little of his heritage before joining the cast. Through research and genetic testing, he traced his origins to the Yaqui tribe. “It gave me purpose in life and an identity that I’m proud of,” he says. “It really felt like it tethered me and grounded me into something bigger than myself.”
For Alice Holmes — the great-granddaughter of Ramona Lubo — the documentary opened a door to healing. She says it took years to feel settled about the past, but the film offered a chance to honor and share her great-grandmother’s story in full.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity to represent our family … and to share that she was real,” Holmes says. “She was a real person.”
