The Casting Society of America will host a town hall for Latino actors as part of its ongoing Commitment to Equity in Entertainment in Casting Initiative, which is designed “to effect concrete change in how actors in historically underrepresented communities are afforded access to job opportunities.”
The town hall, titled ¡Mi Gente! For Latine Actors and with sponsorship from SAG-AFTRA, will be held virtually December 7 at noon PT. Details here.
In recent years, the CSA has held similar town halls for African Americans, Asian Pacific Islanders, Native Americans and military veterans.
Spearheaded by CSA board member Candido Cornejo, panelists will include casting directors Carla Hool, Victor Vasquez and Erika Sable Flores; director Luis Valdez; agent Natalie Moran; producers Greta Talia Fuentes and Jolene Rodriguez; actress Jeirmarie Osorio; manager Ivan De Paz; and casting executive Cesar Rocha. Univision correspondent Daniela Ganoza will serve as co-moderator.
“The CSA Latinx initiative sheds light on the immense need to address the lack of Latinx representation in Hollywood,” Hool said in a statement. “Not only that, it needs to play a very needed role in educating our industry in the fact that we, the Latine community, are a very diverse group of people. It is time we are let out of the box we have been put into and most importantly, I hope we can get to a point where we drop labels and can all become truly equal.”
“As someone working on the front lines with underserved communities and underrepresented youth, it feels very important to me to bring attention to the full meaning of the word ‘inclusion,’” said Flores, who is also executive director of the Youth Cinema Project. “We have to do better. There are entire communities still being left out of careers in entertainment in front and behind the camera. I’m grateful that CSA is willing to have this conversation.”
“I’m beyond grateful to the extraordinary people that are coming together for this important conversation,” Cornejo said. “It’s amazing to have some of these veterans I’ve looked up to join together with some of my peers and colleagues that are true guerreros (warriors) for our community. We must come together as one unified strong voice so that our colleagues can listen in order to understand what is still going on today. It’s a lived experience that we share as a Latine community that is often misrepresented, and it’s important to me for us to rectify that as much as we can.”