Oscar-winner Rita Moreno recently stirred up some controversy with her response to criticism of the lack of Black Latinos in the lead roles of the film adaptation of the musical, In The Heights. Rita’s response was...
“Can’t you just wait a while and leave it alone?” But ignoring accurate representation has been a pattern in Hollywood for years. Rita herself was the only Puerto Rican actress in the 1961 film West Side Story, when half the cast is supposed to be Latino. Rita’s portrayal...
gave the film acclaim for actually casting a Latino in a role meant for us, while the other Puerto Ricans in the movie were played by white people with darker makeup. Rita has even admitted her own skin was darkened for the role (no bueno!). Films like Scarface, La Bamba and...Â
A Beautiful Mind cast Anglo people in Latino roles. And the few Latino performers on our screens can’t possibly represent all of our nuanced experiences. We’ve been told by Hollywood to be proud of any kind of Latino representation, but we deserve more accuracy. We always have.
