Eva Longoria put Hollywood on notice during her Kering Women in Motion talk at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival. The “Desperate Housewives” alum, who was joined by University of Southern California Annenberg professor and researcher Dr.
Stacy L. Smith, is making her feature directorial debut with “Flamin’ Hot,” an inspirational story about a Frito-Lay janitor who invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos.
The film won an audience award at the SXSW Film Festival. As a female director, a first-time director and a Latina director, Longoria said she “felt the weight of my community” and “the weight of every female director” when production started on “Flamin’ Hot.” Speaking with Variety chief correspondent Elizabeth Wagmeister, Longoria noted that Hollywood does not play fair when it comes to films directed by women flopping versus male directors.
There can be no margin of error for a director like Longoria, as one flop could cost her another directorial gig, she says. “We don’t get a lot of bites at the apple,” Longoria said about Latina directors. “My movie wasn’t low budget by any means — it wasn’t $100 million, but it wasn’t $2 million.
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