‘Selena’ is on Netflix. How lawmakers are tackling the lack of Latinos in TV and movies

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“I Love Lucy” had Ricky Ricardo. Jimmy Smits portrayed the first Latino president on “The West Wing.”

“Selena: The Series,” centered around the Tejano singer’s rise to stardom, is one of Netflix’s latest dramas.

Yet depictions of Hispanic Americans on television have not come close to reflecting their share of the population, especially in the Golden State where many are filmed.

The absence of Latino narratives in film and television is such an issue that the Congressional Hispanic Caucus led a House Judiciary Committee hearing this year to address the disparity.

The 38-member caucus and the House Committee on Oversight and Reform requested in October that the U.S. Government Accountability Office issue a report on the matter and “enforce federal equal opportunity requirements” on the film, television and publishing industries — a request the congressional watchdog office accepted the same month.

“It’s long past time that the federal government examine this issue of system racism and exclusion of Latinos in industries like publishing and Hollywood,” said Congressional Hispanic Caucus chair Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, in a statement.

Absence in film and television

A 2020 UCLA study found people of color represented 24% of broadcast-scripted leads during the 2018-19 television season, while white actors represented 76% of leads.

Black actors accounted for 11.6% of broadcast-scripted leads compared to 6.6% of Latino leads, 3.3% of multiracial leads and 1.7% of Asian American leads, according to the report. Overall, white actors accounted 59% of roles in broadcast-scripted shows, followed by Blacks, 18%, Asian Americans, 6%, and Latinos, 5%.

The study also found that network executives were largely white, 92%, and male, 68%, which is “emblematic of Hollywood’s diversity and inclusion problem.”

Latino representation in film also lag.

Only 4.9% of speaking roles in films were held by Latinos, compared to 65.7% of whites, 15.7% of Blacks and 7.2% of Asian Americans, according to a recent analysis of 1,300 popular films released between 2007 and 2019, conducted by USC Annenberg’s Inclusion Initiative.

“Forty-four of the 100 top movies in 2019 erased Hispanic/Latino speaking characters entirely from onscreen roles, which did not differ from 2018 (47 movies) or 2015 (40 movies),” according to the study.

Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo, D-Los Angeles, said that if the state can provide tax breaks for movie and television industries to film in California, then the state should offer incentives for the industries to diversify its workforce to reflect the state’s population.

“When you don’t see yourself, then it devalues our experiences, or it makes it seem as if they are not as important as the experiences of others,” Carrillo said. “The ability to be able to tell our story, write our stories, produce our stories, act in our story is about representation and values.”

It’s why Carrillo is helping to spearhead an effort addressing the lack of Latina representation in the television and film industry within the California Latino Legislative Caucus’ newly formed Unseen Latinas Initiative, created to address the opportunity and pay-wage gaps Hispanic women workers face.

“I absolutely want to see ourselves reflected in music and TV and in film and have our stories be normalized because they are part of the American experience,” she said.

‘A major wave of Latino success’

Twenty-five years after Selena Quintanilla-Perez’s untimely death, fans and new audiences continue to find the singer’s upbringing and family dynamics relatable through the new series that was released Dec. 4, according to Jaime Dávila and Rico Martinez, executive producers of the Netflix series.

It was important for Dávila and Martinez for Latino actors to be cast to play the roles of the Quintanilla family. They also ensured the people working behind the camera were mostly Latino.

“Selena resonates and speaks to so many people,” Martinez said. “It’s also a testament to how she was able to straddle ... her Mexican American identity with her American identity, and I think there’s something special about her music that sort of captured that magic.”

In addition to producing “Selena: The Series,” Campanario Entertainment has created shows for Bravo and Amazon that intentionally center around Latino narratives.

“We’re optimistic that we can change things,” Martinez said. “We’re the biggest supporters and biggest fans of anyone who tries to do Latinx-themed content ... if we all support each other and we all have small wins here and there, then all of us win as a group together.”

As Latino audiences grow, Dávila is confident Latino representation in film and television will grow with it.

“I think there’s going to be a major wave of Latino success in the next couple of years in Hollywood,” he said, in part, due to the release of upcoming Latino-centric films like Lin Manuel Miranda’s “In the Heights” and a Steven Spielberg “West Side Story” remake.

That success, he said, will prove to Hollywood decision-makers that an audience exists for Latino-driven shows.

“It was essential for us to make sure that everyone on this series was (Latino) specifically because we often don’t get those chances to tell our own story,” Dávila said. “The talent in our community is endless.”

This story was originally published December 17, 2020 at 5:00 AM.