An Interview with the Cast of ‘Las Tres Sisters’

(L-R) Marta Méndez Cross, Valeria Maldonaldo, Virginia Novello, and Cristo Fernández as Maria, Lucia, Sofia, and Kin in LAS TRES SISTERS. (Photo Courtesy of Myriad Pictures.)

It is definitely safe to say, that the new motion picture, Las Tres Sisters, is quite the important feature. For not only does it express optimism and hope in these dark times (read our review here), but it also features representation and so much more. In fact, to properly explore the breadth of this incredible movie, we sat down with its cast, Marta Méndez Cross (Maria), Valeria Maldonaldo (Lucia), Virginia Novello (Sofia), and Cristo Fernández (Kin) to further break down this groundbreaking story.
John Betancourt: First off, thank you all so much for you time today. This is a beautiful film, and I’m so looking forward to learning about how you put it together, and I would like to start by getting to know what inspired the creation of this feature.
 
Marta Méndez Cross: It started with the theme of forgiveness, really, you know, that's something that can be really hard just as a human being. So, it started from a very organic place. With Virginia and Valeria, they came together to write a scene about a theme that both of them were dealing with. And it was a two-page scene that was for their actors’ reel, and I was very pregnant and not auditioning anymore as an actress. In that moment, I was about to pop, and they asked me to come on as a director for that short, two-page scene that we developed into a short film that ended up, after that, becoming a feature. And we've just been following a spark of a story that needed to be told, really, to share, you know, a human story about forgiveness. But through the window of like these three Latina women, which we feel like, you know, is also something that we don't get to see much, even as actresses, when we're reading screenplays and pilots and seeing how Hollywood or other folks have written us through their lens, we felt like taking it into our own hands. So, it's been a journey, to say the least.
 
Virginia Novello: So, Marta had worked with Youssef Delara, our other writer, previously, and there’s another person that came in, which is Ruiz de Velasco Gonzalo, and he is a producer that he believed in this project from the beginning. He's the one that was like, “This needs to be a feature. And we were like, really, we weren't thinking about it. And he's like, “No, really, this needs to be a feature,” and we didn't know how to write a feature. And one of the things that I give us props for is that when we don't know something, we don't pretend that we know. We ask for help. So, we are like, we know how to write dialogue, we know story, but we didn't know structure. And so, then Youssef came in, and he wrote a beautiful, structured script. Now, he did the first two drafts, and then we came in, and then we just went with it in a very different way. And we got deeper, because we wrote this for six years. And so, it developed as we developed, you know, as we got deeper into our lives, we put that into the script. As we were growing in our relationships, in our lives. We kept putting it in there. So, the script got deeper and deeper, but we never moved that structure. So, Yousef definitely came in and created a beautiful structure that we could work with and move the script however we wanted.
 
John Betancourt: Now, Cristo, what attracted you to take on the role of Kin in this feature?
 
Cristo Fernández: Well, it was back in 2021, and I was in Guadalajara, and that's where we met, and I just wanted to do more things in my hometown in Mexico. But back then I was away for like, six seven years. I born and raised in Guadalajara, but away for six seven years, and I thought, “it's enough.” I need to go back and have some and eat proper Mexican food with my family, my friends, and I met Virginia, Marta, Valeria, our director, Mar Novo, and our producer, Denisse Prieto. And I just love the story, and I love that it was gonna be in Guadalajara, and it involved different locations, towns that some I knew, some I didn't. But more than anything, I love just the message of the film, and, of course, my character, it was a different way of doing something different. But also, I just love the message of the film, which, to me, it's all about the journey, the miracle is a journey, and it's not -- sometimes we just focus. And I tend to be that kind of guy that... I just want this, and I focus myself in that. I wanted just to be a soccer player and nothing else in my life. And that's cool, but there's other things around it. And I, as you know, I ended up in Ted Lasso. But I would never even have imagined that 10 years before that, when I had my injuries and my life was destroyed, but then 10 years later on, ended up being the best to me, and I think for these sisters, somehow, it's a good reminder that sometimes tragedies in the long run can be, a good thing, as long as you work hard, push yourself, surround yourself with the family, both that you choose, that you're born with, and the one that you choose.
 
John Betancourt: Now there are so many beautiful messages and themes present in this story, and I’m wondering what you ultimately hope audiences take away from this film when they settle in to watch it.
 
Valeria Maldonaldo: You know, yes, I think there's so there are so many messages in this film that we very, very purposely put in there. As we were experiencing things in life and healing our own wounds. We wanted to put it into the script so that hopefully people could also have a cathartic experience while they were watching it. And I mean, what Cristo just said, for me, that's like, one of the biggest things, right, is that sometimes -- I actually, I did the Camino de Santiago many, many years ago, which is the pilgrimage. And I remember that I was walking because I wanted this one thing. I was walking, and I ended up getting all of the other answers that I was not looking for, and all of, like, the healing and all of these other things, and that question wasn't even, like relevant. So, I think that's one of, like, the biggest things that we have in the film. But I think for me, one of the biggest things about this film is the message is about unity. Because, you know, we have three sisters that are very different, that have different belief systems, that have different lifestyles, that have different… everything, and that also don't agree in a lot of things. And then we also have then Cristo’s character, that is, you know, he's in a completely different world than these, like Americanized, at least two of the Americanized sisters, but they find a language. And even actually, like Kin and Lucia, they don't even speak the actual same language, right? They're like communicating in English and in Spanish to each other, but they find a way to connect and to communicate, and in moments like the ones that we're living right now, for me, finding that, that connection with people, and finding a bridge between people, so that it's not just forgiveness, but it's connection, and being able to coexist so that, I think, for me, would be like one of the most, most important things that this film, I hope, teaches people.
 
Virginia Novello: No, yeah, I think, like you said, there were so many messages and so many reasons why we did this. And I think one of the other ones is Mexico, you know, we wanted to just showcase Mexico in a beautiful, amazing way. I think it's… the media, what it usually shows. It shows about, you know, the violence that the country has, and a lot of Latino American countries, but barely rarely, we see also the beautifulness. You know, and every country has everything, right? Every country has the good and the bad and the ugly and the beautiful. But in media and mainstream media, we really don't get to see Mexico in this way. So, for us, it was really important. We said that Mexico is the fourth sister because we really wanted to showcase Mexico and its people, how kind the people are, how even when they don't have anything, they will give it to you, you know, like there were a couple of instances where we did that, you know, of like they will give you their shoes, you know, they will offer you food, they will welcome you to their homes. And there's this kindness that our people have, and the beautiful pueblos mágico that we get to find. So that's another message of, you know, just how one country is not one thing only and there's a beautiful just colors to it. And we wanted to showcase that as well. That was part of also the message for us.
Marta Méndez Cross: They said it so beautifully. I'm just sitting here like a proud older sister. But you know, one thing that keeps coming up that we want people to get from this, and this is more personal and relating to me as my experience as a Latina woman, a Latin American. I'm half Latina and half Irish American. My dad was military and one of the things that keeps coming up at our screenings is Latinos who don't speak the language, and a lot of people feel afraid to get connected to their roots when they have grown up in the US. They feel Latinos feel ashamed to say, “I'm a proud Latino” if they don't speak Spanish and like, can't speak Spanish to their family members. And it's the same for universally, you know you're to embrace your roots. You feel like you have to be those roots, but it's in your blood.
 
And part of me, you know, in this journey, was getting embraced by my Virginia, and Valeria through the whole process. They're like you are… a Latina woman. And we've had a lot of people come up to us after screenings who said, “I hadn't seen myself that way in a movie,” when they show a Latin American or they show a Latino story, it's like, not the American Latino stories offer. And I just, I appreciate that. And one of the interviewers the other day said to us, he's like, “I want to talk to my grandmother. I want to pick up Spanish. I want to try it. I was embarrassed to try it, but I think I'm going to try it.” Because, you know, my character specifically speaks unapologetically, you know, throughout the film, which is part of the comedy, but, you know, it's a real thing. It's a real thing. I've shed real tears about not feeling like I could consider myself Latina because I didn't speak the language, or I didn't know my country as well. So, I hope that people get that, that they it's great to go visit their roots and to embrace themselves and all parts of themselves about that too.
 
John Betancourt: Now Cristo, you spoke to the power of the journey being an important message. But is there anything else you want to add?
 
Cristo Fernández: I mean, yeah, I think when it comes to our film is, as Marta is saying, embracing your roots, embracing, being proud of us as Latino and but also if you're not Latino, it's about embracing who you are and where you've come from, and that, yeah, we can all be different, but we're the same. And I love that message. I personally can tell you that my superpower, and what's given me opportunities is that I'm very Mexican, and I just unapologetically, I thank with a tequila and bring them mazapanes. And I just do that, and by doing that, I share my culture and, yeah, sometimes I know there's still so much to be done in terms of how us as Latinos have to be represented in the cinema, in the movies, and we need more Latinos and Latinas behind the scenes, cast, crew, but also the conversation sometimes tends to go into the I am a victim but we want people to feel empowered with our film. And again, you don't have to only be a Latino. You can be from any other culture but embrace your culture. Embrace who you are as a person, because that’s what makes you unique and special, and just my character, I love Kin, that he randomly ends up helping these three ladies, and what could have been just a random encounter ended up changing his life, because then when he sees them again, he’s helping them more, and then by doing that, he helps himself. So, I think another message is helping others helps you. And helping others is good.
 
John Betancourt: So, something I really want to dive into today… I'm Mexican American myself. As a journalist, I'm only covering one television show right now that is focused on Latinx individuals. So, this is a huge deal, because it's an important project. And I agree with -- I can't think of a project that shows Mexico like this in the slightest, but I want to know for each of you, what it means to you person and be putting forth a project that is so important from representation standpoint.
 
Virginia Novello: It's everything. that's the reason why we started doing this in the first place. You know that we’ve all had different experiences about representation, and all the experiences are valid. You know, like my experience was kind of different from maybe Valeria, or Marta, just because I wasn't getting cast as a Latina, just because I have blue eyes, and they just could not, they could not bear that a Latina had blue eyes, not part of the deal. So, and then I felt so like, oh, a shunned from the movies and the industry as a Latina, because it's like, you cannot play this who you are. You cannot play this of what your essence is. And I was so just very taken aback, you know, which that's why I started writing like, I started writing a short film like, way back when. And then it's so important that people see themselves represented in the screen, which is why we had the three sisters have three different experiences of what a Latina is. You know, they have three very different experiences with languages, even when you grow in the same family, you do, they have very different experiences of their connection to their country, their connection to their motherland, their connection to the country that they were born into, their connection to their grandmother, their connection to their mother, you know? And so, because that's what happens, right?
 
Just because you were born in one family doesn't mean that you all go into one path. And so, we get to represent three different experiences of what is Latina. You know, it's like for Lucia. She doesn't want to speak Spanish because she doesn't want to speak it until it's perfect. You know, she's a perfectionist, and she doesn't feel very Mexican herself. She's battling with like, am I? Am I not? Like she because of the environment that she has to be in, which is, she's a lawyer. She has been like very; I would say word… whitewashed. You know, she had to really assimilate into that world in order to become a very successful lawyer. You know, Maria is somebody that, like, really idolizes, like the idea the fantasize of Mexico, right? So, she has this movie fantasy of Mexico. It's like, she's like, “Viva Mexico!”, and she does all these things that are so extremely funny, but that is like a fantasized version of what Mexico is.
 
And then finally, when she steps into it, right? It's a whole other experience for her being a fish out of water, and for Sofia, she kind of did the opposite, where when she was 18, she moved back to Mexico, and so she really embraced her Mexican-ness, and she kind of shunned her American-ness side, because that involved her family. So she kind of like pushed away her family, and she was like, “No, I'm Mexican”, and I live here now, and you guys are gringas, and I speak Spanish more than many of you, and I know better than any of you about this country, you know, and so, and she feels more Mexican to herself, and she feels more comfortable in Mexico, and she there's a lot of like, battle of, also, of the cultures between them, of like, I'm Chicana, I'm Mexican, I'm this, I'm that. And so, we wanted to just point out that there's so many experiences that being Latino is not a monolith that, like it can cover all different types of skin color, eye color, experiences, languages and all that. And so that was so important to us, that we could get to people, get to watch it and be like, “Oh, I relate to this. Oh, I relate to that. I relate to that.” And it's just not one blanket statement.
 
Marta Méndez Cross: I mean, I started crying when you said you were Mexican American and that you're covering one show, and I cry easily. So sorry right now, because we're in celebration mode. We're finally bringing this, and people are talking about it, and we're talking to someone who's actually experienced this movie, but it's also that you review so many and you're a fan of movies. So, someone like you who's a fan of movies and is getting all the messages and says, how much you love this film. It's just like my wildest dreams; our wildest dreams are coming true. It's wild. But then you touch on very human element of what this film is, and you're like, “I'm Mexican American in this industry, and I'm covering one show even portrays in this way.” And “I've never seen Mexico,” which was intentional to make Mexico, you know, a character in the film. You know love story, a letter to Mexico. But I just… it's wild to me, like we really, we're hitting a nerve that's been there for a long time, but it's, its time, it's timely, because people are open to seeing, like, “Oh, this is how we're not being represented.”
 
Because the representation, that topic’s been talked about so much, but it's like, what? How? What do we do? Like, what does this mean? Like, how do we show representation? Other people are like, we are representing, you know, it's like, really and truly, just allowing the industry to buy films that are varied stories, that are all sorts of stories, because, you know, they're buying the same story over and over. It's not that Latinos aren't writing it. It's not that the stories aren't being written and trying t get made. It's that what's getting bought is the same story over and over. So, then we, as a, you know, with Espectro Mx Films, which is Christo’s production company, executive produced, and, you know, our executive producers in production, we had to work extremely hard to get to this point. Like we wouldn't give up, because we knew that no one else was going to do it. So, I forgot what the question was, though I was so stuck on the fact that you said you were a Mexican American, and I'm still there, in my feelings.
 
John Betancourt: No, you answered it perfectly, and it is a big deal to feature Latinos in popular culture, so please, get your feelings on.
 
Marta Méndez Cross: Thank you so much. No, really, and it's it, I know Susie Mendoza (writer of Dick Bunny) had introduced us, but I mean, the fact that you said yes, you know the fact that you said yes, because I know that you're so incredibly busy. But you saying yes is part of the solution. You as a reviewer, a movie reviewer, we had the same conversation with South by Southwest. Didn't show our film, but we asked the programmer, because I'm from Texas, and it was like something that I dreamed about. I went to UT and, you know, rode through the festival on my bike, like… one day I will show here. So, it was a big one for me to get a “no” from. And we asked the programmer, who was in charge of like, Latino content to have a meeting with us so we can understand why.
 
And he took it, and we told him in the meeting, we're like we looked at your program, and you don't have -- barely any Latinos on your program. The one Latino film is, you know, directed by, you know, white director, white production. You are supposed to be our -- you're a white Welsh man in charge of the Latino section of South by Southwest. But you are an ally. You have to say yes to more films, even if you feel like they don't, you know, whatever in your programming, you have to say yes, as long as it's a good enough film. You have to say yes. Because he said, “Well, we're just a film festival,” and we're like, no. Hollywood. The people buying our film is asking what festival you're playing at to decide if they buy it. I was like, you are part of the system. You are part of this whole thing where in representation, and that's where us on this journey have seen what the problem is with representation. It's that it takes people, it takes allies like you to do the coverage, to actually take the time to watch and to, you know, put it out there.
 
John Betancourt: It was a no-brainer for me, and a big enough deal that I was nervous about this interview, nervous about the review because I want to get it right. It’s that big of a deal. So, I thank you for the opportunity. I do think though, Valeria, you had something to say on this as well.
 
Valeria Maldonaldo: Yes, this is just also beautiful. So, I'm just over here, like, with my popcorn, being like, yeah, I love this cinema. I'm gonna try to keep it short. I just think, you know, I think that there's a reason why this is coming out now. It's, it's taken us nine years to get here, and the movie has kind of chosen itself. It has its own spirit, like what it's going to do, and it's coming out right now. And I think that, in itself is a miracle, because I think right now, specifically, we need to see our Latino community represented in a beautiful way, which is the truth. It's the truth. We're not, we're not lying. And I'm not saying that the other side, which has, you know, like violence and crime that also exists, because in any society, both exist, right? We have like, we'll have people that are criminals, and we'll have people that are, you know, creating a beautiful life for themselves.
 
And so, I think just giving, since our spotlight has been on the crime side, it's now time to put the spotlight on the other beautiful, authentic side of us. And I think now more than ever, we need to put that spotlight. And we are here in this movie, just representing a whole community of so many different countries and so many different variants, like Virginia was saying, the ones that are in states, the ones that are in like in their countries, ones that speak English, but I think, like today, that's what's important. And I had, for example, I was talking to someone that was sharing her story about being undocumented and she was not being able to get medical care. She got hit by a car, literally hit by a car, and couldn't get medical care because she was scared right now to, you know, do anything about it. And it might be, you know, like stupid, but at the end of our conversation afterwards, like, I showed her the trailer for the movie, and she got so excited. And like, I could, like, you know, she had like, tears in her eyes, and she was laughing, and in that moment, I was like, “Oh, this is why. Oh, this is why.” Because, you know, right now, we might not be able to go and change other big things, but we can show those people that we're seeing them, that we are them, and that the world can see them in a very beautiful light. So, I think the timing for me, specifically in my in my like, the way I feel it's perfect, it's perfect. It's what we need.
 
John Betancourt: It really is. Cristo, I’ll let you close us out today with your thoughts.
 
Cristo Fernández: I think we've covered everything. I think we've expressed it beautifully. I'm just grateful to be in this journey with Las Tres Sisters and all the beautiful, talented women in this project. I'm just a lucky dude surrounded by talented women and yeah, just to not repeat myself, I just want to anyone out there that is going to listen to our conversation, that when they come and ask, “What do I have to do to be an actor? What do I have to do to be a writer? What do I have to do to be a photographer? What does it take? It takes nine years to get your film out there, like we did with Las Tres Sisters. And I always say I met my biggest hero, Guillermo Del Toro, from Guadalajara, and he told me that Pinocchio took him 15 years. So, achieving your dreams, building your dreams, making your dreams come true, takes time, takes effort, takes people, takes time, takes patience, takes discipline.
 
Of course, if you want to be one in a million that walks down the street and suddenly you are everything, well, then aim for that. But that's just one in a million. But all of us who don't come from, who are not in the industry or what, when we started, it takes time. So just a reminder that to everyone out there that is going to go and watch, please our film 21st February, in cinemas, and it's important for us to support our film, because that's the only way they're going to be more indie films and more Latino representation, but also more stories that are different, that are not in the general and I just look forward to hearing everyone's thoughts. We are looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts when they go to the cinema and buy the popcorn, and sodas, and nachos, and watch the film in the big screen.
 
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.