Thanks to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, a new Latinx interview video series is here. The show Seen, hosted by Argentinian journalist Nicolas Roberto Barili, will include deep conversations with John Leguizamo, Eva Longoria, and Edward James Olmos while highlighting their contributions to the entertainment industry.
Barili said that Season 1 of Seen honors the actors and shows the community that we are slowly closing the gap in representation.
© Nicolas Barili / Seen“What a dream to host a series celebrating our community leaders like John Leguizamo, Eva Longoria, and Edward James Olmos by giving them the recognition they deserve. Not only for trailblazing with their careers but also for using their platforms to be a voice for our community. I look forward to sharing their journeys, their passions, and their legacy with the world,” Barili tells Deadline. “This is a step in the right direction to address the lack of representation in Hollywood, but we still have a lot of work to do,” he added.
In Seen, Nicolas will engage in conversations to discover how John Leguizamo deals with stereotypical casting, tours Eva Longoria’s alma mater, and surprise alongside Edward James Olmos, students from the Youth Cinema Project.
“The conversation with John resonated with me at my core,” Barili told the publication. “Not only is his show Freak the first time I truly felt seen, but also, he’s broken down walls for our community every step of his career. When Hollywood would only typecast him in stereotypical, one-dimensional roles, he took it upon himself to create, write and perform his own one-man shows that gave Latinos like me a chance to see themselves as three-dimensional characters that we didn’t get to see when we turned on the TV. They were complex, funny, courageous, vulnerable, and made me feel proud to be Latino.”
Nicolas Barili is one of the co-founders of the Latinx in Media & Arts Coalition, a platform to help the youth have a successful career in the entertainment industry while fighting against under-representation in media.
