Thalía: Arrasando

On a scale of one to ten, where would you place your personal Dalia fandom?

Oh gosh five?

Okay?

On a scale of one to ten, where would you place Mexicans level of fandom with Dalia.

Ten being the most Yeah? Ten, She's everything.

She's now.

Has anything surprised you thus far in our research and writing for this episode, because I think a lot has actually taken me a little by surprise. I mean, her story is very well curated. Let's just say that the things that need to be there are there. The things that are not there, I need to do more digging. I can need more Reddit threads on.

Her, like the Rib.

I think we're not going to talk about the Rib yet.

Okay, I mean, since you came in with these hard balling questions, I'm gonna ask you what is your favorite thing about Tellia?

Ooh?

I mean for me, it's the nostalgia of her, and I think the relevancy.

It's really hard to be relevant.

And I remember her launching her collection in Macy's like five years ago or six years ago whenever that was, and I was like.

Still, still, like what are we doing? She's young, she's yeah.

I really think her ability to just transcend from you know, a super cheesy yes I said it, a super cheesy len novela star and not be kept in that box as somebody who's always like, oh, you can only do this. She's like, no, bitch, I'm gonna do everything. I'm gonna be world famous. So I think the tenacity and her ability to break out of that deelenovela box is not easy. Like the world wants to hold you down, They want to keep you in a place where they know you.

Yeah, that is my favorite thing about her. Well, I was going to say, it's more of her just being a bad bitch, Like she just kind of is like, you know, I think you do know stuff about yourself, and she's just kind of like, I want to be world famous. She said it, and I think that she manages that she's a bad bitch. And she did it. However, like so many things happened to her, you know, and then boom, world famous.

Well the show must go on.

And when we last left Tellia Emilio Stefan had a song with her name on it, well figuratively speaking, but the song would become synonymous with the Queen of Latin.

Talk, written by Kika Santandre and produced by Emlio Stefan, piel Morena would have reintroduced the world to Talia. After a two year hiatus from recording studio albums. Sin's Girl was working around the clock on telenovelas, and.

Turns out Emilio and Gloria were actually religious fans of talias telenovelas, and those telenovelas were.

Quickly turning her into a household name around the world.

In her native Mexico, Tealia was basically already the top dog. Case in point. During Michael Jackson's Dangerous World tour in nineteen ninety three, Our Girl was the opening act for all five of the King of Pop States in Mexico.

City, but outside of Mexico, Dalia's global telenovela audience laid the groundwork for piel Morena to spread like wildfire. All those telenovela fans were willing and ready to eat up Talia's new sound and looks, and with the backing of the Mi Telia finally had the resources to give the people what they wanted.

And Lo and behold, the song was a kumbya classic RIAA certified Capital B bop and a half with an iconic video to match.

Piel Morena was the lead single off of nineteen ninety five's and Expasies, an album that Talia described as an.

Intimate moment in which I captured feelings on the sheet. It expresses emotions and situations that are experienced in moments of love.

Basically, Talia is in her feelings on this album, but not just the sorrow of songs like Sangre and Encilenzio, all her joyful, heartbroken, horny, rebellious, capital F feelings.

Our girl had traveled the world in seven seas and her sweet dreams and beautiful nightmares made us last cry and pop it till we dropped.

But real talk, do you think she did ecstasy?

Yes with her mom Andy Pisa.

But was it ecstasy or mbma? Probably the cleaner one. And by the way, no wonder they were hungover when the Pele novela Yin called their hotel room. Anyway and Expasies propelled Talia to pop stardom between nineteen ninety five and nineteen ninety seven. The album sold two million copies, all despite never cracking the Billboard two hundred in US.

And that's despite Gloria and Emilio Stefan's breakthrough in the US years prior. But it goes to show you what K pop bands know today. It ain't all about making it big in the States. Any K pop band can tell you that.

Oh and speaking of East Asia, right after the release of an Expasies, Felia would show some love to her Filipino fan base with an exclusive Philippines only album, Nandito Achi, the first album by a Latino artist to be sung predominantly in Tagalog.

Our girl just loves who loves.

Her, and we love her for them.

And she loves us for loving her, and we love each other. And that's because none of us got enough love in our child. And that's show best kid.

Okay, roxy heart, But love that can't eat, can't sleep, Reach are the stars over the fence? World series Kind of Love would soon find Talia at the height of her fame.

You think our tele novela icon turned pop star isn't getting a novela wedding finale? Pink A camp yats.

Today on becoming an icon.

Dalia's fairy tale ended and everything that came after.

I'm your host, Liliana Rosquez.

And I'm Joseph Carrio, and this is Becoming an.

Icon a weekly podcast where we give you the rundown on how today's most famous latinv stars have shaped pop culture.

And given the world some extra.

Level Sit back and get comfortable.

Because we are going in the only way we know how, with buenas bias.

I'm buenasriesas and a lot of opinions as we relive their greatest achievements on our journey to find out what makes them so iconic.

Hey, Joseph, do you know what else ends.

With the wedding?

Mmmm?

Hallmark movies.

Uh, yes, some of those do, but also the nineteen ninety seven animated film Anastasia.

Uh where are you going with this?

Well, okay, stay with me.

I know we just said Talia hadn't broken through in the US, but there was one way she reached the States other than Latin radio, and that was her Spanish language version of Journey Back in Time, a song from the movie originally sung by Aliyah.

Well, it would it be a finale without a fun fact? So what did Dalia have an off brand Disney wedding?

First of all, shots fired at Anastasia. Second of all, No, we already tease a little something something about her wedding two episodes ago, we did, Yes we did, and now you gotta wait and see what it is Ohka. After the runaway success of NX Thusies, Dalia teamed up with a medio Stephan again, this time for a full album.

One of the sacred texts of Latin pop, y'all, Noana, no Ricky, no Shots.

The lead single slash title track, with its three separate music videos and multiple remixes, Shots number two and number six on two of Billboard's Latin music playlists. It also became a club classic in Europe and set the album off to the races.

Dalia's sixth studio album exceeded her previous release with over two million records sold worldwide. To date, it is Dalia's all time best selling album.

All to say, Dalia was on top of the world, but romantically she was still nursing her wound. She wasn't exactly eager to put herself out there, so.

Emlia Stefan decided to go from hit maker to matchmaker.

As we know, Dalia can get personal with her producers, and she and Emilia had formed a strong friendship.

He told that he had the perfect man for her, that they were identical in the way they thought, the way they saw life, the way they enjoyed life, and according to him, they were peas in a pot.

But there was a catch. Emilio told her he did just get divorced, and.

She said, well, hey, no, shade here, get yourself back out there, daddy.

And Emilio said, oh wait, that reminds me he's also a dad.

Dahlia was like, all good, how old the little blado?

Uh? Two? I mean two kids? He has two kids.

I love kids. Kids. How old are they?

I don't know how old the kids are, but he's twenty years.

Older than you. I no, no, no, we're not doing that again.

Listeners, we kid, we kid we jess. But Talia, well you can probably imagine that after her Silver Fox late fiance tragically left her a widower.

She wasn't looking for another daddy, so she swiped left on theme on the sky.

And before you think this is one sided, he swiped left too. This bachelor's ex wife was also in the music industry, and he I wasn't looking to make that mistake.

Again because listeners. In case you didn't.

Know, Emelio's guy was Tommy Motola, president of Sony Music and ex husband of Mariah As in.

Carrie, I'm actually angry that you gave her a last name because we don't need to.

I know that was it, but like I just want.

What are you doing?

What are you?

What are you doing anyway? Y'all? When he left, she lost a piece of her but I digress.

Amelia went back to hit making, and in nineteen ninety eight, Talia moved on to her first English language film role, playing the female lead in Mambo Cafe.

But one day she was born on set and she gave a.

Milia call, Oh for funzies, can we say, Okay, we got to make this real quick, Joe, because we've got a wedding to get to.

Okay. Emilia picks up the phone in the middle of listening to a demo from Pitbull actually gets a mixtape.

Why is Piple always popping up? Like he just pops like here I am entering.

Before he was big And he picks up the phone. He sees it, Dalia. He stops the tape and answers. Dlia says, one drink, drink that's it.

Bitch was bored.

You know when you're bored, you a lot, or you're like I'm bored or I'm hungry.

I need attention.

She needed attention anyway.

Listener's quick disclaimer that this fan fiction portion is FFO for funsies only, and we do not claim to know that Emilio Estefan ever listened to Pitbull's mixtapes anyway back to the show, and we also don't know that Dalia was just looking for a drink or attention, but it tracks, so we'll keep going.

So Da'lia hemmed and hot her way to the bar, waited for Tommy with her legs and arms crossed like whatever I do want to be here really, and.

In walks Tommy and the two hit it off.

One day became two, Two became three, and cut.

To nineteen ninety nine. Dahlia's busy shooting her first delenovela Sincmaria's trilogy, Rosaline. When Tommy surprises.

Her, he produces a little box with a pink bough. Talia thinks she's about to faint. She tells herself, quote, get a hold of yourself. It's probably just dependent or earrings and you're here thinking it's an engagement ring.

And this will fake Stelia out, taking her ears in between his fingers and says they're gonna look great, before revealing that, yes, the box did contain a ring.

Fast forward to December second, two thousand. A crowd gathers in front of a church, but not just any church, Saint Patrick's Cathedral on Fifth Avenue in New York City.

Yes, and there it is.

A limousine pulls in front of the cathedral and outsteps Telia in a dress by Samed Mexican designer Mitzi, a darn with Sarowski crystals, pearls and silver threads. And now she approaches the great doors of the cathedral. The train of the dress goes on and on and on and on.

It's said that it's still there, okay, but for real, the thing was fifty five feet long. Seeing the train her sister, they made him honor realize coote, my god, the car was full of the tail of the dress.

The train ends up getting caught on the steps of the church a couple of times, but other than that, the wedding goes off without a hitch with its twelve hundred guests, including Jlo and Marc Anthony and Julu Les. Yes, the wedding ends up being one of the biggest ever events in Mexican media, despite taking place in New York City. Oh. Also in attendance Robert De Niro and Danny DeVito Black.

Imagine, like you just were not randomly invited, but like you're no.

Randomly invited, randomly invited. You were randomly invited.

Call it out.

You don't have twelve hundred friends. Just be clear, no, no, no.

Not you.

I mean you, like in the general, like in the world. Nobody you nobody. You don't have twelve hundred friends. And if you say you have two fund friends, I don't believe you or trust you. I have like six friends. How many friends do you have?

Yeah?

Like that?

Like six.

The wedding was big, It was over the top.

And as of today, Talia and Tommy are celebrating twenty four years of marriage.

Y'all.

That is some kind of Guinness World record because celebrity couples, Hollywood couples, they do not.

Stay together for twenty four years.

And to be honest, despite what you think of this over the top wedding.

It's the perfect fairytale ending. To Talia's charmed Deele novella.

Life, except this ain't the end and it ain't no fairytale either.

Fresh off for wedding the early aunts, Talia riding high with a string of chart smashing albums two thousand's Arassando, two thousand and two, self titled Balia and two thousand and five and Sexto Sentido. So was singer doing a lapse around current trends in dance pop and Latin pop. She also released an album of bunda versions of her greatest hits Balia GONBANDA.

Oh my god, Arassando is like my coming out song, not really my coming out song.

But like, I what do you mean coming out?

Not coming down? I was out since I was like nine, but I mean like when I would go to the gay bars like that, because I would go to quaties. Obviously I was like sixteen and that, and I remember that song. I mean this, yeah, this is in two thousand two, those one. I was like seventeen and that song just reminds me of just my coming to bay. Where were you when Arasando came out?

I was college, definitely college.

Oh my god, you probably heard the shit out of that song too.

I heard it and like all of our like so reminder for those of you that have not been following

Only played Spanish music.

And so for me, it was a really defining moment because it was the first time, I felt really connected to not only Latin pop, but like she's Mexicana like.

I am, and I'm like, yeah, yeah.

She brought me much deeper into the pride that I started to finally feel about being Latina, not just Latina, but being Mexicana. And that didn't happen for me until honestly, like college, Like I talk about this all the time, Like it did not become a source of pride for me until I was like in my early twenties. Like literally in college. You took me leaving Texas, which you would think would be the source of like all Mexican

Simply put, she was royalty, but remember, fanking put a target on your back and on the backs of people close to you.

In two thousand and two, while Talia was on tour supporting her self titled album, her sister and maid of honor, Laudas Abata, was performing in a play in Mexico and on.

A crisp September night, Dalia's other sister, Ernestina, got dulled up and went to see her sister on stage. Hours later, the casts took their final bow and got their flowers.

Ernestina congratulated Lauda and the two sisters left the theater together, but they didn't make it home. They were ambushed by armed men, forced into a van, and driven to a safe house.

When Dalia heard about this from her nephew, she thought it was a prank, but then a photo was released showing Talia's sister blindfolded and held at gunpoint. The kidnappers demanded millions from her husband, Tommy Motola's fortune.

Since this was an international incident, the US government froz both Tommy and Talia's bank accounts, leaving them unable to pay the ransom, making matters worse, rumors and misinformation put a world of pressure on the negotiations.

Gossip began to spread that Taliah was going to roll into Mexico with an American special ops team to free her.

Sister, which is totally a movie I would watch, but I digress. But in reality, Dalia was learning about the kidnappers demandster the TV right along with us.

Still, once the kidnappers learned that the famous couple's accounts were frozen, they released Laura Sabatta as a bargaining chip and made new demands five million pissels.

A deal was strung.

Dalia paid the ransom and Ednestina was released after her sister.

All together.

Lauda was held for eighteen days and Ernestina for thirty six.

But things can get easier from there. This incident was great for the tabloids, and they kept trying to keep the gravy train rolling by accusing Lauda of masterminding the entire kidnapping.

Talia and m Nestina decided not to engage with the speculation, and Dalia stuck to the strategy of non engagement for years.

But Lauda Sabatta took this as a betrayal. In two thousand and five, Lauda began developing a stage play based on her experience being kidnapped. However, she said, without naming names, that someone in the family you threatened legal action. The play never went up.

Then, in two thousand and six, Ernestina publishes a book about her experience being kidnapped and states that Lauda had known the kidnappers beforehand, all but corroborating what the tabloids had been saying.

On the one hand, this is cold pressed, vacuum filed tell novela grade a juice.

On the other hand, Lauda was the sister who inspired Dalia to get on the stage in the first place.

Of this ordeal, Lauda would eventually tell the press.

At the time, it hurt a lot, It was very painful, But now that I look back on it, I was a victim of the kidnappers.

And a victim of Thalia.

Thinking about how the press treated Dalia at the start of her solo career, you can maybe see why she didn't want to get into it with them.

Still, this family rift continues today, and if there's anything we've learned in our becoming an icon journey, when it comes to trauma, it bonds people, but it can also tear them apart. And by the way, I'm also going to hold the media accountable here because that's kind of where.

It all started, right.

It started with the speculation over her having a role in the kidnapping, and then it went on from there, whether she did or didn't. When press gets involved and they have an ulterior motive, it could become a pressure cooker.

True, and the kidnapping isn't the only example. Remember Talia's formative beef with Paulina Rubio that never went.

Away, right you are bou Dalia ruled the nineties, but her bandmate from Timbriche, Paulina Rubio, also broke into the international market in the early two thousands with a series of hit singles, including the Anglo market with the song border Girl Joseph's favorite.

I Really Do Love That, Okay. Dalia had gained a rep as the Latina Madonna in the nineties, but in the odds, the press was eager to make her and Ballina the Latina Christina and Brittany.

To hear Dalia's take on the feud, she told Reuters, it is more what the media has done than what is reality. I always try to reinvent myself and give the best of me without thinking about any kind of rivalry or competition.

But that didn't stop Paulina from making shady comments about Talia's clothing line and chocolate brand and her husband, who she called an old man.

I mean, where's the lie anyway? Well, nothing would ever match that infamous on stage fight at the Pinbotichi show. The Press's eagerness to feed that fire and Ballina's tendency to do just that led their estrangement to drag on for decades.

In twenty ten, Dalia would tell Ulibision the Paulina I knew and the Talia that she knew. We're no longer the same. If we were to, we would have some tequilas at Takisa. We would talk about our things, and it would be a lot of fun.

To the public's knowledge.

This still hasn't happened, but they may have reason to hope. We all want the same thing, a dele novella happily ever after for our queen.

But as we've seen, life's just not that simple.

Near the end of the Odds, Dahlia's hot drig was cut short when lyme disease kept her from promoting her two thousand and eight album Lunada.

I said the singer, I got very sick. I almost lost my life. I lost my hair, my muscle mass the will to get ahead. She spent two years on antibiotics, focusing on healing with the support of her family.

It was a brush of death that changed Dahlia. After Lunada sank on the charts, she moved on from Ami and joined Sony to release two thousand and nine s Primera Phila, a stripped live album that cut out all the glad.

Belia recorded the album in a small auditorium in Miami, sporting a simple look jeans, a white top, and a vest. The sound of the album is as stripped down as her look. It's giving MTVM plug, it's giving cowboy junkies, but we know our girl.

That doesn't mean she's done with Glenny for good facts.

In October of that year, Belia is invited to the White House for an event celebrating the Latino community. She attends along with Eva Longoria, Jlo and Mark and performs a more La Mexicana on stage.

And in the middle of her song she stops off stage and walks straight to President Obama's table and asks him to.

Dance and thanks Michelle for being cool with it.

The dance last all of ten seconds, and it's not all that clear Obama knows how.

To dance salsa.

But it's exactly the kind of bold, spirit animal behavior we've come to love from Thalia ever since she told it straight to the president of Televisa back in the eighties.

It was her first Bible moment in the Internet age, and guess what our girl thrives on? TikTok.

Then there was the Talia Challenge a few years ago, where people imitated a video of her trying on a bright pink dress and doing a goofy dance.

And the time she went to the beach wearing one of the original costumes of Marie mad and recreated the opening credit sequence.

Like who's feeding her these ideas? Are they just like thinking comes up with on her own? Oh, and the time she poked fun at an old tabloid rumor that she'd had one of her ribs removed to make her waist smaller. She took a video of herself at a taco stand picking up a rib and saying, oh my god, I can't wait. She said this, I found it.

She also went full drag king and dressed up as Marvel's Doctor Strange for Halloween, with the caption one the wait it is most strange characters strange.

That picture will haunt me for the rest of my life.

So amazing. It's the visual to this. It's like Dalia being so pretty and so glam and she has like a go tea and short hair. You need to look it.

Up, but it's like Chris Jenner's hair. It's like Chris Jenner with a go tee. Is what it looks like in a Marvel costume. It's why you got it.

Thank you.

This is the wild depths of the Internet.

But that's not to say she just slept through the twenty tens and resurfaced on TikTok. The twenty twelve album A Beata missiepre returned Talia to dominance on the Latin Fillboard charts, selling half a million copies worldwide and leading her to embark on her first tour in nine years. Essentially a comeback tour. The Viva World Tour was one of the most anticipated concert events of the decade.

And then she released a children's album to accompany her children's book, Choopy the Binkie That.

Returned Home, even as a mother of two. Our girl really just kind of does what she wants. And across seven more albums, including another kid's album and an album of covers of her favorite Latin rock song from her eighties and nineties, Heyday, Dalia blessed the next generation of Latin pop stars with her presence.

She's thing with Maluma on the track, with Becky g and Chiki thri Vera on by La Si and with Unci Laguilar group of Fiedman and most recently our favorite artists from Sinaloa, Kenya Os.

Talia is in a way that only the most legendary icons managed to achieve. Forever young. And I'm not just talking about her looks, but she does definitely have some Benjamin buttonshit going on. I'm talking about her confidence, her raw talent. It's her ability to be herself authentically without a second thought.

That bitchu blessing in the Tella Visa president's office and wasn't afraid to ask for what she wanted. The hardworking girl locked up in her bedroom with the shades down because she needed a mend her heart. The meme queen cracking jokes on social media.

We all want to be as unapologetically ourselves as we were when we were kids, and Dalia's proof that we can be.

And we also can get into fights when we're young, but they might not be forever facts.

Since twenty seventeen, Ballina Rubio has been hinting at a reunion tour with Dalia.

The first hint was a hashtag throwback Thursday Instagram post of the old band Femettice.

More recently, she's directed statements straight to Talia. Quote, let's plan the tour, as Shakira said, there's a special place in hell for women who don't support other women.

Oh I don't know how I feel about that.

Go on tour with me, or you're a bad feminist.

Look, at the end of the day, Baulina is still fucking Baulina, you know what I mean? Like Thalia is still Dahlia, and you never know what might happen with Lauda. But I feel like that's kind of what we love about this whole story, right, Like, just like a good Beele novela we have to keep tuning in to see if our faves can find and they're happily ever after,