LOS ANGELES -- "I'm John Leguizamo and I'm one of Hollywood's DEI hires." That's how the actor introduced himself to the audience at the 2024 Emmys Sunday night. "That's right," Leguizamo continued.
"The D is for diligence, the E is for excellence and the I is for imagination." Emmys 2024 Live Updates : Jeremy Allen White, 'The Bear' snag big wins at 76th Emmy Awards With that, the four-time nominee, one-time Emmy winner launched into a speech that was as passionate as it was funny as he called for more representation in the stories we tell on television and who we choose to cast in them. "Growing up in Jackson Heights, Queens, a scrawny little wannabe gangster, I didn't know people like me could be actors," he told the room full of actors, writers and entertainment industry leaders.
"At 15 I didn't know the word representation." But he recalled seeing brown face all over his screen: Marlon Brando playing a Mexican in "Viva Zapata!," Al Pacino as Cuban gangster Tony Montana in "Scarface," and Natalie Wood playing the Puerto Rican beauty at the heart of "West Side Story." "Everyone played us, except us," Leguizamo said.
When he did see Latino representation, it was in limited stereotypical roles like Ricky Ricardo in "I Love Lucy," or the only Mexican characters in Loony Toons, Speedy Gonzalez and his lazy sidekick Slowpoke Rodruigez. RELATED: See the full list of 2024 Emmys winners "That's how we saw ourselves, because that's all we saw of ourselves," he said. For years, Legu.