Reyes details good along with bad, ugly history
Contributions to film industry by Latinos celebrated in books
If Hollywood buffs want to jog their memory about the exact proportions of the Mexican water tank where James Cameron shot “Titanic,” Luis Reyes has the answer. If a Latina filmmaker seeks to brush up on her cinematic heritage, she can check out Reyes on TV critiquing Dolores del Rio’s and J. Lo’s most emblematic roles.
And if an #OscarsSo White activist demands to know why Charlton Heston was cast in brownface to play a Mexican narcotics agent in “Touch of Evil,” and why there remains a scandalous shortage of Latinos in leading-man roles, Reyes might reply that ... well, it’s complicated.
Growing up in New York, the son of a Puerto Rican father and a Dominican mother, Reyes developed a lifelong liaison with darkened spaces. Decades later, he still can recount in granular detail the day that he saw “Planet of the Apes.” He took in “Spartacus,” rooted for John Wayne’s Captain Jake Cutter in “The Comancheros” and hooted at Jerry Lewis’ Nutty Professor.
“When you live in New York, you have the whole world at your feet, especially in Manhattan,” Reyes said.
Born in 1953, Reyes knows everybody and remembers everything about the movies, knowledge that he gleaned not only through countless afternoons in cushioned seats but also through his extensive one-on-one interviews with actors, directors and writers and many years spent working as a publicist, hanging out on movie sets with
everyone from Anthony Quinn to Salma Hayek and Mel Gibson.
He started writing about movies as a high school student and later for an organization called ASPIRA that assisted Puerto Rican students. He dreamed of being an actor and snagged a few bit parts.
“But I found out I wasn’t that good an actor.” Plus, Hollywood folks didn’t think he “looked Mexican” enough.
“A lot of times people thought I was Black; they didn’t think I was Mexican. Because they didn’t have Dominicans at that time.”
Then he took a friend’s suggestion to switch to publicity. Lights! Camera! Career!
“The whole process of making movies interested me more than the acting part. To be a publicist you have to be nice with people, and you have to write notes for the movie, so it’s like a term paper. And you got
to be on the set, and you got to see how it all came together from beginning to end, which later came in handy while writing the books.”
Authoritative, anecdoterich and ardently written, Reyes’ books chronicle the all-too-obscure tale of the multitudes of Latinos, Latin Americans and a few Iberians who’ve shaped Hollywood since the silent era. Regarded as essential reference texts by students, academics and industry pros, they include “Made in Mexico,” “Hispanics in Hollywood” and his latest, “Viva Hollywood: The Legacy of Latin and Hispanic Artists in American Film.”
They tell how silent screen idol Ramon Novarro — born Jose Ramon Gil Samaniego in Durango, Mexico — minted the archetype of the Latin lover; why two Puerto Rican performers — first Rita Moreno, then Ariana
De Bose — won Oscars playing Anita in the 1960 and 2021 versions, respectively, of “West Side Story.”
“We as Latinos did not work in a vacuum; we worked with everybody,” Reyes said. “We’re part of Hollywood history. We weren’t acknowledged, but we were there.”
And if you’ve pondered why Yalitza Aparicio won an Oscar for “Roma” but “really hasn’t done that much since” (Reyes’ words), or whether Tenoch Huerta’s career may follow a different trajectory after his “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” breakout performance, Reyes can school you in the history of how the industry has gorged on fresh Latino talent while usually denying its members second and third chances.
But while Reyes has written eloquently and unsparingly about the discrimination that pervades Hollywood, “I didn’t want to dwell on that,” he said. “I wanted to dwell on the achievements.” His writings celebrate what is the most “American” of all art forms precisely because it was birthed by immigrants from everywhere.
Luis Valdez, the director, playwright and screenwriter, said Reyes’ books provide “a tremendous service for future generations” by showing the contributions Latinos have made to the film industry and the obstacles they’ve encountered and surmounted.
“I think he’s laid it out in a very clean way, the categories of stardom and the legacy going back to the silent days in Hollywood,” Valdez said. “And he’s done it without prejudicial anger … He’s not grinding an ax, he’s laying it out so that everybody can relate and come to their own conclusions.”
Reyes knows better than practically anyone how Hollywood still keeps its drawbridge half-raised to Latinos trying to enter the magic kingdom. In decades past, Latinos were hired to play all kinds of roles: Native Americans, Arabs, you name it. And many of the “Latino” roles were crude, reductive and racist. Too many still are.
Reyes believes that “an actor is an actor and should be allowed to play any role he can believably play and that his talents allow him to, and that audiences will accept.” The problem, as he sees it, is that Latinos and Latinas don’t get equal opportunity to fill leading roles and other marquee technical posts on ambitious, artistic films or bigbudget blockbusters.
“And it becomes a selffulfilling prophesy: ‘Oh, there are no Latino leading actors.’ ”
Still, Reyes was heartened by this year’s Oscar contestants such as Ana De Armas, Guillermo del Toro and “Argentina, 1985,” and for the multiple accolades accorded to “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” He’s looking forward to upcoming feature films with Cheech Marin and Esai Morales, among many others. He’s encouraged at the way TV, streaming and other platforms are giving Latinos more shots at employment.
Though he’s not ready to stop writing, he may ride off into the sunset someday to visit Rome and Paris, then take the train to Barcelona, Granada ... “Because I want to go to Almeria. Where they shot all the spaghetti westerns, of course.”
And he wants to revisit Durango, which bodydoubled for many Hollywood westerns, their gunshots and brash gringo accents ringing out across the arid Mexican plains.
“It’s cowboy country, John Wayne. I always say, ‘La tierra de Pancho Villa y de John Wayne!’ ”