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Aimee Garcia is bringing in regards to the change she needs to see in Hollywood. The Lucifer actress stars within the new Netflix vacation movie Christmas With You, which premieres on November 17. HollywoodLife spoke EXCLUSIVELY with Aimee about why she was drawn to this movie particularly amid the vacation film craze.
“Rising up, I by no means noticed a basic Christmas film with a Latino household. Even now, an all-American basic Christmas film, the place on the middle of it’s a Latino household, I feel can also be uncommon. And never solely is there range in entrance of the digicam, but in addition behind the digicam. There’s a Latina director, Gabriela Tagliavini; Latino producers, German Torres; Latino writers. So I feel in its personal approach, it’s this trailblazing film the place it’s a Christmas basic. It has all of the stuff you like — romance, household, coronary heart, and humor — but it surely additionally has a Latino POV. It has tequila and tamales and just a little little bit of Spanish and a multicultural facet to it, which I feel is so stunning, as a result of one of many largest compliments was I simply went on Kelly Clarkson, and he or she mentioned, ‘I wished to be a part of this household. I watched it with my youngsters, and it made me need to be a part of this household.’ It’s so stunning to simply have a movie that’s common however the household on the middle simply occurs to be Latino.”
Aimee stars as a pop star named Angelina who escapes town to grant a younger fan’s want in small-town New York after experiencing profession burnout. Since she’s enjoying a pop star, Aimee really devoted herself to the function. She did all of her personal singing, dancing, and piano enjoying within the movie. She performs 3 songs in Christmas With You, together with a Christmas tune.
The actress revealed that she had “three days to arrange” to document the songs. “I’m not going to turn out to be knowledgeable singer in a single day. All I might do was simply sing from my coronary heart. I’m not one of the best singer, and I don’t have one of the best vary. I’m not knowledgeable. However I simply sang actually,” Aimee mentioned.
Aimee additionally opened up about Angelina’s journey over the course of the movie. “She has fame and fortune and Grammys, however she doesn’t have love,” Aimee mentioned about Angelina. “Enter the very charming Freddie Prinze Jr. who I feel was everybody’s heartthrob again within the day. Angelina’s been accused of not being related anymore, which I feel is a really relatable factor for anyone of any gender. It’s a really human factor to really feel such as you’re not valued anymore, and also you’re not wanted anymore. So she goes by way of that when she’s changed by a youthful, extra profitable pop star.
She continued, “She actually needs to reconnect together with her followers, and he or she finds this younger girl who was about to have her quinceañera, and her Christmas want is to have a selfie. That’s what begins us on our journey of this fish out of water, complete diva, coming right into a small city and possibly or possibly not falling for the music trainer who’s the 14-year-old’s dad. It has Notting Hill vibes.”
Aimee added that Christmas With You is “very female-forward in that she’s the sort of unattainable one, and he’s the homemaker. It’s very nice to see that swap, and Freddie does such an exquisite job. I imply, I feel it’s his first romantic comedy in 20 years. So in a approach, it’s a comeback for him, which is de facto enjoyable.”
The Lucifer alum gushed over working alongside Freddie within the movie. “He was so skilled. He simply has this very refined attraction, and I really like the alternatives he made,” Aimee informed HollywoodLife. “He has Hugh Grant attraction, however he doesn’t have Hugh Grant exterior power. He actually attracts you in as an actor and as an viewers. He was simply at all times all the way down to attempt scenes otherwise. He has the largest coronary heart, and he would kill me if I mentioned this, however he’s simply gooey on the within. I feel that it’ll be very nice for individuals to see him as only a charming, romantic main man, which he does so effortlessly however otherwise, proper?”
Aimee was excited to showcase a few of her Latina tradition within the movie, together with her mother’s particular cure-all. “My mother’s cure-all for every thing is tequila. Sprained your ankle? Tequila. When you have a headache… tequila. So clearly, it was actually enjoyable to see the grandma deliver that out as a cure-all for every thing. That felt very comforting,” Aimee informed HollywoodLife.
Spanish can also be Aimee’s first language, and he or she was grateful to have “sure strains” in Spanish. “I’ve to provide Netflix lots of credit score,” she mentioned. “Originally of the method. I mentioned, ‘Would it not be doable to do a stanza of the Christmas tune in Spanish?’ And Netflix mentioned sure. I translated it myself as a result of I used to be googling American Latin Christmas songs, and the one factor that saved arising was ‘Feliz Navidad.’ So I believed it’d be very nice to have an unique Christmas tune that has just a little little bit of Spanish in there. That felt very nice as a result of in my household we sing and dance in each Spanish and English as a result of we’re Mexican and Puerto Rican. It was very nice to deliver that to this very candy Christmas film.”
Along with performing, Aimee additionally has her personal manufacturing firm that she began with New York Occasions bestselling creator AJ Mendez. “We began this manufacturing firm, Scrappy Coronary heart, and we determined to create the change we wished to see. We wrote a bunch of comics within the DC universe, in Dungeons and Dragons, very female-forward in like writing Latin households within the Surprise Girl world.”
She went on to say, “We wrote the sequel to 47 Ronin and wrote for feminine samurai, as a result of we thought, why can’t feminine samurai exist in films? We’re very pleased that the 2 protagonists of the film are feminine, and it simply dropped on Netflix on October 25. It’s a film that we co-wrote and it highlights badass ladies. I really feel like hopefully if there isn’t a sequel my purpose is simply to jot down the flicks and the exhibits that I didn’t have as a child, like a ton of Christmas films with Latina leads and motion films with ladies of coloration which might be simply female-forward. I hope that we’re headed in the best course. There nonetheless is an extended strategy to go, however I really feel like one of the best ways to actually implement change is simply to roll up your sleeves and create and write the change your self.”
