So you saw me up there playing an Italian, you know, a mob's wife, an Italian mob's wife. I played a couple immigrants. Actually, three of those scenes were... One is set in Mexico and two, actually two were set in Mexico, one was set here stateside and they were immigrants. The truth of the matter is I'm none of those things. I'm a Puerto Rican actress that was raised on an army base here in Central Texas.
Welcome to another episode of Talking Pictures, a podcast dedicated to discussing film, filmmakers, and film trends. Hosted by me, James Faust, artistic director of the Dallas International Film Festival. Produced by Commerce House and brought to you by Diff. Thank you all for being here and thank you for making films.
I'm going to start off the end with what I said. So tell us about models and making that go. And is it what you wanted to actually make? Or somebody said, this is who you are, this is what you make. That's an interesting question. I mean, it's weird. I was just telling you before this, I haven't seen this movie in over two years. I made this back in 2019 and finished it during the pandemic.
It was a long life with the film, it was a long editing process, but it changes, you know, if you're a filmmaker in the audience, if you know this saying very well, if a movie gets written three times, you write it once in the script. one sunset and one's in the edit. And we really found this one in the edit. I can tell you that it was based off of something very personal that happened to me back in 2018.
My dad got sick. He's a mechanic like Sergio in the film. I directed Mount Zorro, the black and white film, the first one you watched. He's not a raging alcoholic like the character. Can you guys hear me? All right, I'll just talk loud. So I was inspired to make this film back in 2018. My dad got sick.
he had this like weird nervous system condition that kept him in the hospital for like a month and uh my dad's a mechanic he's just like old school mexican guy super machista like i'm the man of the house and you know has this like really like heavy attitude towards everything he does
And, you know, to watch him go through this experience and be bedridden for a month, that was pretty horrible. You know, it was like watching a lion in a cage that can actually do the thing that he feels he was meant here to do, not be a provider, not work, get his hands dirty. He comes from that kind of... that bravado style of just getting gritty. It wasn't what I wanted to make, actually. I was writing another script about AI. I was writing something completely different.
This happened and I just, I felt as one of the few moments in my career where I'm just like, I have to stop everything and like react to this. And I did, you know, it's very personal. Like it, it borrows from the truth, but it isn't the truth. Like I was mentioning, my dad is not.
at all like he's kind of not like an asshole like that you know what I mean but you know he is a mechanic and that is his shop that we shot at that is his gas station next to his shop and I made something that I think in spirit
feels what it is that I wanted to make. I look at it now, I mean, I directed another movie between now and then, and I'm just like, would I have done that? Because you grow as a filmmaker, as a director, and I'm still very proud of this piece, and I hope you guys enjoyed it.
But I think what I'm most proud of, truthfully, to kind of get to the nucleus of your question, James, like I feel like win, lose or draw, you know, regardless of festivals and awards and whatever happens with all of our films, like what I'm very proud of in my film in particular is that like. it's very accessible for a lot of people because yes it happens to be in spanish and yes it happens to have mexican mexican american characters but um
when my African-American friends and my white friends and my Asian friends watch my film and go, oh, that's my dad. That's my mom. You know, there's a universality to it that I think is really beautiful. And that to me is... That's sort of my diatribe and my mandate as a filmmaker is to normalize these Latino stories that have nothing to do with what conventionally Hollywood wants us to output. You know, it's like it almost feels like a...
I don't know, we'll probably get to this, but it almost feels like Hollywood's like, you're an immigrant, tell us how bad it is, you know? And that's sort of all we're limited to. We're just kind of shaped within that box. And I kind of...
With this film and with the one I just made, I'd like to kind of hold up a middle finger to that and go, no, we're worth so much more. You know, our feelings are valid across the spectrum of emotions and the feelings. And I'm very proud of it. And for that reason, yeah. It wasn't what was expected of me, but it was what I wanted to make. Yeah, so the title is Chicle Gun. It also feels very personal to talk into this story.
Yeah. Yeah, no, I feel very honored to be here, you know, amongst very talented folks as well as everybody here too, who are very talented too. you know chicle it's very interesting to see it because i did make it years years ago uh premiered at south by uh which is what its world premiere was um and then after that did several other films as well too um but i think just like coming from it definitely yes it was
you know a personal story um at the end of it um i was grieving it's also navigating my identity too and so there was a lot of like confusion in terms of like you know what any time of things you receive attention you there's just it's just this hodgemodge of things right um and yeah it was kind of interesting to see it because like i'm about to get married and i'm like oh that's like my grandpa's not gonna be at my wedding you know so it's just like really interesting to kind of
Document a time of my life that I've had all these feelings. And like Merced said, it's like none of that happened verbatim in my life. Like we didn't have the wake at our home. You know, he died at a hospital, you know, and. all these things, but it's definitely a learning experience. I mean, this film was shot within also two months apart because...
We had to do one reshoot, I would say, of that scene outside, which we got really lucky with. And we were able to match her makeup because at one point our actress had some stuff on her face and then the next time she had nothing on her face. We had to like almost redo a lot of things about a couple of months later to reshoot the front yard scene. So that was just really cool to kind of like reminisce a lot of that. But yeah, storytelling, it's interesting. Watching it now, years later.
What we left off there was... I heard two stints on Guardians of the Galaxy 3 and Guardians of the Galaxy Christmas Session. Yeah, Suicide Squad. Suicide Squad. And Suicide Squad as well, sorry. And Suicide Squad as well. what we were talking about earlier and um pigeonholing and I was asking when people see your name if you were seeing straight when you're going out footballers.
Are you always, I hate this, I will do my best. Are you always getting Latino roles? Are you just, are you going out for everything? And in reference to Guardians of the Galaxy, that particular character. is it's sort of it seems like it was nondescript but you said that you didn't receive anything and that james gun sort of just does what he does did everybody hear that kind of question okay great um so
You asked, it's like three questions in one. And so I'll start from the beginning. I've been, so you guys saw Julio in Manos de Oro, Julio Cedillo. Has been acting in Dallas. I want to say for 25 years at 33. Okay, very long time. I've been doing it now since 2011 and don't ask me that math is I can't do it in my head. I'm 13 But in the beginning of my career, there was something that was happening in the industry that later became DEI.
But before DEI, what is it? DEI stands for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. Before DEI, something that was happening was... We had this very binary look to a lot of actors who were either black or you were white and if you were neither what the term they gave you was ethnically ambiguous and So I am an ethnically ambiguous actor at least I was for a long time. So you saw me up there playing an Italian, you know, mob's wife, an Italian mob's wife.
I played a couple immigrants, actually three of those scenes were, one is set in Mexico and two, actually two were set in Mexico, one was set here stateside and they were immigrants. The truth of the matter is I'm none of those things. I'm a Puerto Rican actress that was born on an, raised in, hello, raised on an army base here in Central Texas. And so, you know.
The thing that I think now people are recognizing and it took us a long time to get here is that Latinos are not a monolith. We have a diverse... Within the Latino culture, we have a very diverse and colorful variety of cultures. Some are really interesting, you know, indigenous. Some are... African-based, some even Asian-based, right? Like if you go to Chile, you're going to find a lot of Japanese and Chinese people.
And so just as the United States itself is very diverse culturally, Latino America and the Caribbean is also very diverse. And we have different stories to tell. But for a long time, if you were Latino past... and you spoke Spanish pretty much the only jobs that you could get were like playing sad immigrants and so like Merced said you know we have a lot more stories to tell And I think we're getting to a point with like, for instance, the what is this movie, the Hot Cheetos movie?
that Eva Longoria produced and also for the one that she produced before that that also Julio was in about the guy that goes to space. A million miles away. Other stories right that we can tell. So, so yeah, so initially ethnically ambiguous, then now also like very Latino focused. And now I don't know, we'll see. We'll see if we keep telling our own stories, maybe we can just be normal people.
telling normal stories i would love to tell a story about being an average latina doing average things that are not spectacular because white people get it all the time you know we watch um seth rogan and James Franco and Pineapple Express being like the most average people, but we don't really get to tell those stories. So you were asking about guardians and...
Suicide Squad. And what's beautiful about that, and I was telling this James, is that James Gunn is a really interesting guy. He writes for people that he likes and he also... writes for like the best actor for the role. Who knew, right? So when he's casting, probably some of the most diverse casts I've ever been on was Guardians because he basically... I didn't audition for the project. He just invited me to be on his set because I'd already done Suicide Squad for him. And we're aliens.
You don't have to be anybody to be an alien. You don't have to look a certain way to be aliens, right? And he really leaned into that. So there's another Latino actor in town named...
Giorardo Davila is a really good friend of mine who was in alien makeup and he got electrocuted in Guardians which was a lot of fun. And then you know we had a lot of really diverse people from all over. I had a friend from um israel a friend from palestine a friend from louisiana creole from louisiana we were all you know aliens it didn't matter background did it matter ethnicity didn't matter it was really beautiful um and yeah i'm not gonna
go into the next next thing i don't think i'm allowed to talk about that but all of that to say like when you audition for somebody who's that high up and it doesn't matter he really does pick the best person for the job So that's really lovely. So all that to say, in the beginning, we started off with, well, you got to be ethnically ambiguous. And now it's like, does it matter? I don't know. Hopefully not.
Latino cinema and just what's going on in the world as we've done, as we've worked together on showing films like this for almost 20 years and just speak to, you know, what people are wanting and as the cinema, as this world is growing. To start from a point of mentioning that there's the pigeon holding of roles, the pigeon holding of stories, one of the things...
in programming the Dallas International Film Festival and just going through hundreds of movies from Latin America and from the US and even from elsewhere. There has been... that trend of, oh, the immigrant story is about crossing the border or the struggle for immigration or the drug wars. And that's Latino. And the trend has been going down. Thankfully, for the Latino filmmakers, the trends have been... that bandwagon is now on other...
Spain paying for that type of, oh, we're going to do that drug war stories. So the trends are shifting, and that's because... I mean, this is coming from several studies from the USC Annenberg Center for Media and others. The Latino, we're not a monolith culturally. However, we do behave in things like economics as a block. In this country, though. In this country. In this country. But also as a region in terms of entertainment.
Not everything hits in all the countries, but it's a big block. Doing the quick math in my head, it's about a billion people. for Latin America. That's a huge market. There's two languages that you have to cover if you want to, you know, do the outreach. There is a tradition of going to the movies culturally. that you go with the family, it's an event that you attend. So there's a huge economic power behind being that size of a block. And not everybody's paying attention.
However, Latino filmmakers are paying attention and it's telling the stories that we all know we want to tell because we are tired of seeing the same representation over and over and over again. To paraphrase John Leguizamo back at the Emmys, a few... a couple of weeks ago like everybody has represented us but us um and that's um getting pride back a little bit in recent times which i
fully support and fully appreciate. As part of the programming, like we're starting to see more comedies and like normal, not even the sad slice of life that you would think. but more inspiring, cheer up, as you said, like normal characters. in up-and-coming movies. And that also has to do with switching how things get financed in Latin America specifically, who gets an opportunity here in the US because those are two very different ballgames.
there is a there's a shift going on and i think that we're all here part of it luckily I talk about it all the time. As a black man, I don't always want to go see the game film. I don't always want to go see the main film. And, you know, you're just in LA. And, you know, some interesting meetings as you're arrested. As a film maker, what are they offering? I want to do this. Is there a pushback? Are you offering those only?
I'll give you a little context. So I was just in Los Angeles for a week last week presenting my film app for Mano Zorro that I screened at a festival and a part of this festival they include meetings with industry reps and just people of the business. I met people at Focus Features, at Amazon. I had a private meeting with someone at Disney last Friday.
um so you're meeting with like these really top-notch executives and people that are like who are you we heard you're great like we heard your film was in a festival tell us about you and we're all talking about this like like it's not just latino executives it's white executives everywhere We're all aware that this is a thing in our community that we're kind of getting tired of. But I think one of the things that I always react to and I always respond to in those meetings is that...
By us, for us is a really delicate balance, right? What I mean by that is by us, like we as filmmakers who happen to be Latinos, making things only for Latinos because then what ends up happening is that after season one or two... of these movies or films get canceled because they're so hyper specific to the point where like no general audiences want to watch or care to watch.
We can't get up in arms about that. We can't be our own worst enemies. We talk about that a lot. It's like, how can we tell stories that are universal, but are yet so specific to us and our culture and our people and our language?
that is accessible for everybody. Because at the end of the day, like it's called show business for a reason. It is show entertainment and it's business. And I've become more acutely aware of that, especially after these meetings that I've been taking and just talking to people and trying to get a manager.
By the end of this year, going into next year, it's like, okay, what do you want to make? That's a question that comes up constantly. It's like, well, I want to make films that have Latino leads. And right away, it's like, hmm.
okay like all right tell us more how much is it gonna cost what are you looking to do so the story itself has to has to it has to have meat it has to be something that we can all like look at a movie like i always use this example i think it's a beautiful movie like moonlight
We've all seen Moonlight, you know, that masterpiece, masterpiece. That is a beautiful, beautiful film that you don't have to be African-American to understand it and access it. It is there and in charge of emotion for all of us, you know. We all cry, we all want it, and it's beautiful. I want something like that for the Latino American community. And I use that term specifically because, I guess, Hispanic American, right, if you will.
Latin American directors like Pablo Lorraine, Alfonso Cuaron, Iñárritu, these are our masters. These are our Latin American cinephiles that get to do whatever they want. They get to make Birdman and they get to make Roma and Gravity.
and we laud them the world over but then like when you add Mexican-American, Puerto Rican-American, like when you're a one-two thing you get confused and mass audiences in the U.S. get confused and for better for worse I don't quite know but... it's felt like for worse because we don't have a place you know you're either this or you're that you know and i um again what i mentioned earlier is that like i i always tell people
It's time for other people to see themselves in Austin, not the other way around. Just as we grew up all watching the James Gunn films and Spielberg films and David Fincher films. Who do I see about that? Having Latinos. have just as valid as an experience so i guess answer your direct question directly like it is coming up i get offered i get scripts all the time for like writers or i'll take meetings with people they're like you want to direct my like immigrant
Like, my papa picked berries in the fucking Peru story. And I'm like, there's a place for that. But I don't. And those stories are just as valid as anybody's. But I don't want to be a part of the. of the screaming into the void of the similar stories that feel like that's all that's being asked of us. I want original, I want new, emotionally charged stories that have nothing to do with the things that...
and are just always in our face. How about a TV show or a film where a character just casually speaks Spanish? Great. Like, why can't we have more of that, right? And maybe no subtitles. Because why do we need subtitles? there are so many people in this country that speak spanish you know that it would be really fun to just normalize speaking spanish yeah yeah i would agree i would agree
The conversations are happening. I guess the point is, which is a good thing, but conversation needs to lead to action. So it's good to talk about it. We're all aware and we're all singing Kumbaya. Yes. We all love it.
You know, we support these filmmakers in their vision, but if nothing gets done and we're all just kind of cycling the same. I've been on panels like this before and I take a meeting with them for years now, and it is a lot of the same. I think we're inching closer to the goalpost. every single year that I've been doing this, I've been doing this seven, six, seven years now. We've gotten closer. We're not quite there yet. You know, so until.
i get an offer early set gets an offer or any one of other my other latino friends in the u.s get offers to tell these large either blockbusters or these intimate indies that are A24 and focus features and all that that happen to have some Latino leads. Name me one director, name me a couple, name me three.
that are Hispanic-American, that look like us, that are Mexican-American, that get those opportunities. You can't. I can't. I certainly can't. I can't name him. I do this for a living. I can't name him. You know? Guillermo. Guillermo's Mexican, and, you know, he... But, like, Mexican. So that's the point he's making is you're either going to be from there or you're going to be out of the hospital. Yes, thank you. That's exactly my point. When you're square in the middle, it feels hard.
I was thinking about this outside of, you know, the first three of the Desperado series. I don't know if he's done anything else that is, you know, his panic commitment. Like, it's just, he does just... I think Spy Kids is like, I just saw a video about this a couple days ago.
i didn't really quite clock just how innovative spike kids was you know like they're going in and out of spanish and i remember seeing that movie and just i loved it as a kid you know and now i i saw this video just talking about just how innovative it was and that's neat incredible more of that please um yeah i mean look it's one thing like robert rodriguez is a mexican-american director great it's another for him to like make movies that are like these days like he hasn't really
His output hasn't really been... We all love you, Robert. We all love you, Robert. We all love you. But, you know, in the last couple of years, Robert's been a champion of these conversations, and I think it's awesome. But we have to do more. It can't just be one person. It can't just be me. It can't just be Lisette. It can't just be Robert. There needs to be so much more. It can't just be Robert's output consistently that we point to and go, there's our guy. That's my point.
He sort of talked about the challenges of getting the build done. Yeah, it's tough. I mean... There are certain things that I think several programs were helpful in the past but then went away.
like for example i'm part of several other projects um where it's an anthology project of five latinas from texas and you know we got a warner meet warner media um grant for like 100k you know but even then that program went away and then now it's finally back in some ways um after years of it you know but just
It's hard because you have to do this. You have to do the networking. I mean, I've been to Gotham. I've been to different things of the pitching networks. I've been managed before. I'm no longer managed. It's an up and down thing. Lived in LA, you know, stayed on people's homes, you know, done like the whole like kind of trans things from Texas to here to North Carolina, you know, where we're hired in a TV show. It's tough, you know, and I'm still in the midst of like.
at this point you know writing my first feature gone through several drafts um been very blessed to have like really amazing mentors in the industry who um you know, who have, who's seen something in me. And I think that's part of the way, like each of us, I feel you have to have an ally inside who has another ally inside because.
I work from the studio side of things where it's like as the showrunner's assistant studios really fucked up. I'm sorry. I know that's recorded, but there's a lot of things that you see that.
i also should probably speak of from people who represent us quote unquote right and so you know there's a whole thing of people put a face on there but when you're really behind the scenes are they really advocating for you are they blacklisting you from stuff and that's something to also understand is that
Yeah, you can't trust everybody in this business. You can put all your marbles in or out, but it depends. You have to follow intuition. And you continuously have to have that backbone of like...
You know, if it's a Robert Rodriguez scenario, how he started in was like giving blood and giving his body to stuff, right? I mean, I recently worked with this producer, Elizabeth Avellon, who, you know, is... works is part owner i believe i'm sorry if i misspoken elizabeth but i know part of troublemaker studios you know so her understanding the side of how they began you know um you know everyone has this you know i don't think a lot of us come
sometimes from the privileged parts of it. And if we do, I think that's also great because that's what I want to see too. I want to see us as privileged people. You know, part of it's whether or not we decide to aim for something that like, it's like James Gunn movie or not.
want to be in like an andrew arnold movie like well she's my freaking hero and i would love to meet also recorded you know but i want to be the lisette barrera or you know or just lisette whichever i just said for my last name but you know it's at the end of the day it's like you know what you tell us like i think what we as audiences resonate is does it feel genuine or not do you resonate it in some stuff under your cup of tea and that's okay you know but i think you know to our point of like
If you want to see us more, we have to put our money down, whether or not you're paying streaming for a download, coming to the theaters. I don't know. I mean, I think at the end of the day, like we can't continuously sometimes cater to things that are already there and how we're going to start from the ground up and people who are already like doing the shit, you know, like apoyándonos and all that stuff. So, you know, it's.
it's this but yeah you know but we're here to support each other and figure out like how can we figure out how to like you know because i have mentees and i have mentors and it's like it's a chain and that's the only way i feel like sometimes to get people to really like you know because it is a name game at the end of the day um yeah okay yeah she's getting married like a month so uh six days i think it was yeah i mean
uh no actually no it's been a while we shot across we shot four days straight and then we took a break across the weekend just because of my work schedule because i had a day job and then we shot the final two days So, yeah, it was six days. I mean, obviously, it's a long short film. If you've watched short films, that is long. That's very long. Thank you. Thank you.
Incredible work. And I just wanted to ask to, to your point about, it's beautiful to see the cultural lens, but there's something so universal about grief and emotional complication. of your films and I was thinking about what you're talking about. All the emotional complications I have with parents and I was wondering in context of that.
Did you find it cathartic, therapeutic? What did you do to kind of improve the grief that comes up when you're dealing with that personally? You know, did you feel like how I was upset? And into this conversation, I was thinking about that to work with.
Ava DuVernay's team a couple years ago, and she was talking about always, her teams were always talking about how they always felt like they had a hand on their back, they said they had their back on set. So I just kind of was like wondering, like, who had your back on set to get you through that? Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, definitely looking forward if I were to do things differently. I wish I had like a therapist on set or something or the lead of her mother. I mean.
just to get her into that state um i mean we tried every way afterwards to give her the space to calm to like make sure that she wasn't going to go any way too far She decided she wanted to go as far as she wanted to, but there was like this time where we had to give her space because she did have a panic attack basically on set. Like she just was like really crying and going through like what she had experienced when she had a lot, you know, through any family members.
when her representation is my grandma my family you know that kind of thing when people just like fall um and yeah i mean at the time i had some really great friends who were there too to help out i think just kind of go through it
And when I did see like, you know, Pablo Esparza, who played like quote unquote, like the representation of my grandfather, I mean, there were certain things that made it almost like too close. And I think maybe I'm like, oof, like it was hard a couple of times to see it.
couple of photos of my grandpa myself but you know there's little sprinkles of like personal things in there um but yeah um i think definitely like how we had a great group of people and I think that was I think the most important is the choosing of allowing your producers also to help bring in those people that can understand and at least empathize.
uh what's happening because you wouldn't want to have like the one person who's working be like oh you know and all of a sudden you're like ah you get the you know the actors you know the talent like they're their focus you know and so i think that's another thing is um respecting also the talent that's in front of the camera and asking them what do you need to help you get into that space um and just
collaborating that way to make sure that they still feel good and safe and have the reach to be able to impact that. Yeah, those moments were really pretty impactful and we had a lot of our crew members at that moment like really hard and we just had to take a break. yeah um okay um i'll just add to that just because i can um there's that saying right like filmmakers don't go to therapy they make movies about it
If I stop living, I stop making movies. Quite frankly, I rip off from my life more than I care to admit. I don't know how to do it in any other way, quite frankly. They're very personal, but like I said at the beginning, these films, my film in particular, this one I just made last year, they borrow a lot from the truth, but they're not the truth properly. Like I said, my dad is not...
I like this character, but there are certain qualities that he does share. How to process it. I mean, I don't know. I write what I... I'm kind of figuring this out as I'm speaking. I just write what's going on in my life. Whether it's my fears, my anxieties, ideas that I have about things that I can then access. Because otherwise, if I can't add a touch of my personal life or something, then it ceases to exist and it doesn't feel like it's mine. It just feels like I'm...
screaming into the void and just contributing to something that doesn't feel like it's the way I make cinema, you know, the way I make movies. This last one I just made is called The Morning Of. It's about death and grief.
um that's been a constant in my life for a lot for many years it's been a fear of mine just losing my loved ones going to funerals with friends and their family and we made this film last year we wrapped it in march we edit but we locked it and then three months later my grandpa passed
like oh that's why this movie fell into my life you know and i felt more equipped than ever to be able to process that because i made a movie about grief and i'm a very buttoned up planned person i mean i'm very like i'm very set The one thing I leave magic for in my life is movies, you know, and this is the magic of movies. You know, it just it just happens. And it happened that I made something about something that was already a fear of mine anyway. And then.
The life just kind of held up a mirror in my face and was like, you needed it, you know. This issue that you're talking about where certain cultures aren't being represented as much, specifically Hispanic cultures, do you feel like that problem has gotten worse?
You mentioned Spy Kids in the 90s and the 2000s, even multicultural movies like Babbo, where these cultures are getting a lot of play and you're not being pandered to by it. Do you think maybe it's a script issue, just generally, and also something else?
Or has it gotten better since then? I'll take a stab at this. I think it's a double-edged sword, man, because I think, you know... it has gotten better right like it it really really has like there have been more filmmakers that look like us that have had an opportunity to make really cool stuff um
But it is Hollywood's acceptance of it that's the problem. Like, I can write a script. The Zuck can write a script. We can all write scripts tomorrow that are, like, Latino-driven. And, you know, they have these themes and they have these characters that, you know, you eventually will cast as Latinas or Mexican-Americans or Grooving-Americans or whatever.
But it's one thing, it's a paradigm shift. And Hollywood's willingness to open the door for us and give us a little more money, a little more money, a little more money. There's a massive economic opportunity that is being left at the table.
by not normalizing latino stories like it's it's kind of stupid quite frankly um that we don't market and push our stories more but at the same time like again i mentioned this earlier like We can we sometimes we us as Latino filmmakers filmmakers who happen to be Latino, we can often be our own worst enemies here because like you want to make I can I can promise you I can go I can write a script about the border crisis and about.
my identity as a mexican-american and i could pitch it tomorrow and i'll probably get five million dollars to make it because hollywood's like that that you're that that's what that we you're that you know if i write a dramatic like if I made Mano Zoron to a feature about a father son he's a mechanic his son works at the shop he used to work at he's supporting him it's a drama ghost you know so it is like
If I wanted to, if I wanted to make a movie fast, there's another truism in our culture. Horror films are getting made out the wazoo because they're so audience friendly. Great. A lot of my friends who are killer filmmakers are making awesome feature films that are... you know horror films and they're getting programmed and they're getting bought um and equally some latino friends make a film and go how can i make a movie that's going to get into sundays you know oh i know
I will say one thing, too. I think we forget sometimes that and maybe don't actually understand that the script. Sometimes even though it has one person's name or a couple of people's names, if it's coming from a studio level or some company, there's a lot of notes and revisions to get it greenlit. So sometimes it's very hard to understand, specifically in the TV world.
whose really voice that is um because it all becomes really mixed and so there is that component too that ends up happening and you're like oh why did they decide that it's like well some of the dialogue, some of the action is what's going to quote-unquote appeal to a bigger audience if that's a note that somebody gives them. So there's that too. And as somebody who reads a lot of scripts, television and film...
I would agree with everything that Lisette and Merced are saying, but I have a different perspective because I'm reading these scripts, right? So number one, while telling Latino stories or like... like Hispanic leaning stories is something that we're seeing more of. The challenge has not disappeared. I just think people are now accepting.
the challenge and are self-producing to that end as an actor i am self-producing a film because i am tired of people waiting for somebody to green light me right because here's the thing when you're a latino actor And this kind of goes back to James's question that he asked earlier. We have like two stereotypes. You're either the gangster or the gangster or like the...
I'm going to say this word, but I, you know, I hope you know that I mean this with so much respect, but a whore, right? A lady of the night, or you're like a nun or a priest. You know what I mean? Like there's no like real in between. You're either like.
committing crimes or you're like a catholic right like there's not a whole lot of in between and um and so when when we're talking about like Latino-led stories, the ones that are being greenlit are the ones in which Latinos are basically taking the reins into their own hands and saying, I'm going to greenlight myself and hopefully at some point, because I've shown you my credibility, you will co-sign to this.
right and so that's kind of what i'm doing right now i have a film that's in the works right now it's got a modest budget of 300k that we're in the fundraising for right now. And I wrote this from the ground up with my friends and we have a diverse cast. We've got...
You know, a black woman, a Latino woman, a Jewish woman and a white woman. I mean, the Jewish woman is also white, but like that cultural difference. Right. And we just decided to green light ourselves because we're tired of waiting for somebody to green light us. I don't. I don't want to continue playing the same immigrant wife, mom who lost her husband to ICE. I don't want to keep playing the woman at the border who gets picked, right? I don't want to keep playing.
the nun or the i mean i've done it i don't want to do it anymore and so and in reading the scripts like i worked in the writers room at Queen of the South for two years. And one thing that I can say about Queen of the South is that 50% of the writers were Latino, but the other 50% were white. Why? Because USA had to pander to...
like a universal audience. Right. And it was one of their most popular shows. Right. That network had that show had five seasons on that network. It was one of their most popular shows. It was Latino led and the showrunners were Latino and something that Merced said that. came to mind. I can't watch the show because I read the scripts and the scripts were a lot more Latino leaning.
And so when we were in the writer's room reading the script, the scripts were a lot more like, had a lot of really amazing like elements of Latino-isms, right?
And then by the time the show got shot, I mean, some of that stuff was in there, but it was watered down. And I tried to watch a few of the shows, a few of the episodes, and I couldn't, you know? Well, because the story that was written... versus the story that was shot versus the story that was in the can by the time it was released it was a completely different story does that make sense so the scripts were a lot more like
And so the scene that you saw, the scene that you saw of myself that's that made it in where I'm the immigrant mom and it's it's, you know, it's set in the 70s or whatever. Right. We saw a clip from that. The reason that made it in, that was all improvised. They were not going to put any of that in. Really? Yes. But the lead actor, who's a good friend of mine, Joe Rojas, who's from Mexico, and myself, we were mic'd up.
Because the director was Latino. And he said, I want to mic you. And I want you, you both speak Spanish, right? Yeah, we speak Spanish. I'm like, well, my accent's a little jacked because I'm Puerto Rican. But yeah, I speak Spanish. And he was like, okay, we're going to mic you. I want you to improvise some stuff. We'll see what happens. And everything that we improvised made it in, but that role originally had no lines. Yeah, well, Veronica...
who is from Mexico City, was very intricate in coaching, like Joaquin, for instance, who's Portuguese, who played her husband on the show. And then you have Anna, who's from Brazil. playing, again, somebody from Culiacan or from Sinaloa. So you have actors in the show who are Latino or from Latin America, rather, who are not Hispanic, if that makes sense. And those are two different things.
Yeah, and you can tell. So who here knows the difference between Latino and Hispanic? Okay, a lot of people didn't put up their hands. So I'm going to explain it really quickly, okay? In Latin America, there are... non-Hispanic countries. The obvious one is Brazil, another one is British, they colonized the British island of, or country of, what was it?
Well, there's Haiti, there's Grenada, there's other, Belize, Guiana, yeah, these places. So they're South American, but they are not, they were colonized by the Spanish, so... They're considered not Hispanic, but Latino because it's based in Latin America. Does that make sense? So Latinos speak Portuguese. They are from India.
they are from Africa, they are from China, if they were born in Latin America, but they are not necessarily Hispanic, right? And those of us who came from the colonization of Spain, we are considered Hispanic. So there are two different things.
And that's the other thing is a lot of people don't understand. When we talk about Latino America, we are talking about black people. There are black Panamanians. You know what I mean? There are black Puerto Ricans. There are black Cubans. There are black Dominicans. They are Latino. They are not Hispanic. Right? We need to tell those stories too. And yet, where are they? You know, they're not there. We have another question up here.
It is more or less a comment and question just seeing the sheer vulnerability and the bravery that you guys actually came into that actually had this. posted on the screen is just much more of a reward. I've met three of you guys through various stages and I can just say you guys are an incredible inspiration. Liz, congratulations.
by the way thank you um i do have one quick question who would you consider your your inspiration is it an author continuously go reoccur back when you read novels that come up with stories or is it just like a particular person in your life that actually kind of touched you. Yeah, I mean, it's a cycle of a lot of things. I take a lot of inspiration from the Dogma 93, sorry, 95, wow, movement. So Thomas Winterberg, Celebration Festin, Andrea Arnold.
between the filmmaker and not the actor. And then just like in life, you know, we improvise daily, I'm improvising right now. You know, there's just, there's, and then it, but it's always starts with the feeling.
and i yeah i've always started very much with that and um and what is it that i it that it feels genuine and the most part of it but whenever i'm stuck yeah i'm watching a lot of uh 595 movies and drowning my sorrows and all that but you know by the realisticness of it it's um that and my producer brain at times comes in and i do budgets yeah
Hi, thank you so much for all of us. This is really insightful. I'm a man of two budding filmmakers that are living in North Hollywood right now. They graduated two years ago from Newt to Austin, and they're fine in Phillytown. to break into the business so i hear you um me and my girlfriend here and a lot of my uh i mean that's very involved in a lot of organizations is there anything there didn't there used to be like that
National Latino Film Association. Is there any place where you all go for support? And if not, is that me? Nalip? Yeah, I was thinking Nalip. And then we also have... The LFI runs LALIF, the Latino Film Institute runs a great festival that I've played at. Latino Film Institute, LALIF is Los Angeles, Latino International Film Festival. Yeah, LALIF is a great one, LFI, New Filmmakers Los Angeles. That's where I was screening my film last year.
I wouldn't be here if it weren't for them. You know, they just will randomly call me and be like, or said, we're going to put you up for this Disney thing. And I'm like, huh? Okay. You know, but once you're in, they really support you and it means the world. So like there are champions out there. Could we use more? Hell yeah. Hell yeah.
And to that end, your sons that are moving to Hollywood right now, it's a really hard time because the industry has not recovered from COVID and the double strikes. And there's still a strike right now that not a lot of people talk about because it doesn't affect film and television.
specifically, but it's a really hard time. I feel like right now the industry is limping along at like 60% of what it was pre-COVID. And I personally don't believe it's going to come back until 2026. So if they can make their own stuff. Now would be the time to do it. Yeah. Good. Good. Okay. I'm a college professor. I have some of my students here tonight. I teach downtown Dallas. 75% of our students are Latino, Hispanic.
This is funny. And they've never heard about this as a career. They've never been taught that this is an educational opportunity for them. Where do they go? In Dallas or in Texas? And is Texas the best state? for movies to be made that have to do with this theme, and what do they do and what do I tell them? There's some of them right here that you can tell them. I used to teach also at UT Arlington and I'm also a Longhorn. I went to the MFA program there. The Longhorns are here. Say what?
I did. RIP. Yeah, man, bless his heart. Yeah, David Pinkston was really, I taught with David his last year before I left. And he continued. But yeah, I would say I think a couple of resources. It is a very hard career. And I think depending, you know, there is a commercial side of things that can keep you awake. That's part of the reason why I started producing as well. It's like what I can make money off of.
I've just really been blessed to get in through several companies to help as just a freelancer at this moment. I think it's one thing to always know. you have to be very you can you can have a trajectory but you also have to have a duality of like what is the realisticness to get you to that point So I would suggest whether that's if you do an MFA in your teaching to get the money and still be able to be in the film kind of side of things, being in commercials, but dabbling between film and TV.
or be working like in an agency or company that necessarily doesn't have to be film related. But I found really good success with not myself, but with people of the industry who are also who work in in the housing market and so there's like different things that you can make your money off to get what you want to do also um there's a there's not a one way um
But I think in our business, it's hard, but you also want to be smart about it and figure out how can you use the skills that you have to get the skills that you want to do. I want to touch on that for just a quick beat. That's right, it's really hard. It is so difficult. There are resources and there are opportunities out there to seize upon. Internships, you know, to help you to learn.
I didn't go to film school. I went to UT. I studied advertising because I was too much of a chicken to major in film because I didn't think that a Latino from South Oak Cliff had any business making movies. I just didn't. I wanted to make movies my whole life. I couldn't fathom asking my parents to send me to film school. What? Movies? What is that? So I did an internship while I was in my senior year in Austin when I finally just said, screw it, I'm going to do it.
And I find my way. And I don't want to touch on that. You guys will find your way. Once you do your first internship and you start to meet people, you've got a good head on your shoulders. You'll find a way. You won't start. What I will talk to you about if you're a Latino interested in wanting to work in film and make cinema.
do this for a career it is going to be difficult just by the nature of what it is that we do but also if you have immigrant parents that is really hard and i'm here to tell you it ain't it ain't easy even if you don't even if you don't like My parents, you know, they're from Mexico. My dad's a mechanic. My mom is a homemaker her whole life. They don't understand, like, what is that? They can't comprehend the notion that...
Not only are you not doing what it is you studied in college, but also, are you going to take photos? Are you going to shoot weddings and music videos? You write the thing, and then who's going to help you? Where are you going to get that money? you're going to get an onset of questions and doubt. And I promise you, if you just stick, if your students are in the audience, I'm guessing they are like.
If you stick to this, and if you really, really, truly want to make movies, and it's all you think about, and it's all, like, you wake up, and it's the first thing you think about, you throw movies on, you can't wait till the weekend so you can catch up on all the movies that's coming out on Netflix and on Hulu, it's like...
You don't know how to do anything else but do this. Do it and run as fast as you can towards it. But it is going to be a challenge. But I promise you, however it may seem, how difficult it may be, it seems like your parents are on your head. they don't get it and they're never going to get it wait till they watch the first movie maybe even the second they're going to be at every quinceanera and every wedding i promise you my parents
It went into my third movie, then when they saw Mano Soto, they're like, okay, we're good. So they're my biggest fans. My parents do crafty in all my movies to this day. They do the crafties, crafties like the snacks and the food and stuff. My mom.
i can't imagine this is so corny i can't imagine a set without my mom on it frankly because like my my films are very homemade you know they're very punk rock and like my mom is just there and i'm like mom what are we feeding people i want my mom to help me on my feature film you know she has anything else to do like come on and help us out yeah yeah she was on my last film yeah so my mom was there um but my point is like involve them
and let them ask you questions bring them to set show them that mijo and mija are pointing the camera you know i promise you they're going to be like on facebook like i think the theory is when you have parents that are from elsewhere Again, Puerto Rican, can't call myself an immigrant, but my mother, when she came here to this place, didn't speak English. She only spoke Spanish. She was straight from the island.
She always instilled in me the value of education. And she said, you don't have to get it. Like when I was 16 and I wanted to get a job, right? She said, you don't have to get a job, but like you have to get an education. You have to go to school. So when I told her I was going to school for art, she was not pleased, right? Like she was not happy. But because we were, I mean, I'm going to say it, poor, right?
my parents didn't put any money into my education i found ways i had a scholarship i had army money i had all sorts of things that i piecemeal together to go to school and so i was like okay well like they're not on the one hand it sucks because i'm paying for this myself but on the other hand it's really liberating because i can do whatever the hell i want but
the fear was always there right because when my mom came here she had two jobs working at a daycare my dad was a truck driver he worked in a prison when he left the army um my dad's a high school dropout he's got his ged but like the struggle right like it's really hard and they wanted me to be a lawyer they wanted me to doc be a doctor they want to be anything other than an artist and so for me the fuel to my fire was showing that so it was really first of all disheartening
because I had to prove to them that I could do this thing that I knew that I could do. But it was also fueled in my fire because I knew that I could show them. I just needed the time. And so for me, the most important thing, the thing that I would say to you is find the thing that pays your bills. Find the thing that feeds your art. Sometimes they're the same.
Sometimes they're not, but you need the survival job in order to thrive, right? Like you need the survival job in order to do the thing that you love to do and reinvest in yourself as much as possible. For years, I had a survival job working at a theater. I was waiting tables. I was working at a daycare just like my mom. I was teaching. I was doing whatever.
and all the extra money that came from my survival job i reinvested it in myself whether it was my education or my materials or my craft right and so like reinvest in yourself as much as you possibly can if it's for you it will come to you guys i've made four movies and i still have a day job i work in progressive insurance right now i'm a producer on their video team i make the flow commercials and stuff
Just because this is a panel of multi-hat wearers of writer-producers, multi-performers, super talented. it takes an army to make movies and television you you know what uh who like really runs the production the accountant like you need electrician you need construction you need uh
people that do the props, that build all the cool things that you see on the camera. You need artists that are not in front of the camera, not even making the big decisions. They're just making things look pretty. Like there are so many things that you can do in film and still. and be a filmmaker. It's not always the writer, director. We may be biased because we all like that part, but it's one of the reasons that I love film is that it's
the most collaborative of all the arts. You cannot make a movie by yourself. Even if it's a teeny tiny documentary, you're gonna need help. If you want to bond with someone fast, spend a few days with them on a set, you are connected by blood. It's like summer camp. So we have run way over time.
Talking Pictures comes to you from the Dallas International Film Festival, a.k.a. DIFF, with production stuff by Commerce House. Our theme music was composed by Fresh Squeeze Music. Find us wherever you find your podcast. I'm James Faust. Thanks for tuning in.