Eva Longoria criticizes Hollywood: "White male directs $200M flop & gets another, I can't"

Eva Longoria seized the opportunity to deliver a powerful message to Hollywood during her Kering Women in Motion talk at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival. 

The renowned Desperate Housewives alum, accompanied by Dr. Stacy L. Smith, a prominent professor and researcher from University of Southern California Annenberg, used the platform to discuss her upcoming feature directorial debut, Flamin' Hot. 

By sharing her journey and   film's success, Longoria aimed to bring attention to the unequal opportunities and challenges faced by marginalized voices within the industry.

"We don’t get a lot of bites at the apple,"  she said about Latina directors.

 "My movie wasn’t low budget by any means — but it wasn’t $2 million.

She  continued, "The problem is if this movie fails, people go, Oh Latino stories don’t work…female directors really don’t cut it. 

A white male can direct a $200 million film, fail and get another one.

 That’s the problem. I get one at-bat, one chance, work twice as hard, 2x fast, twice as cheap."

Dr. Stacy, commended Eva for her dedication to taking action in the realm of inclusivity. 

"Are we showing the stories that aren’t told? And then who is working behind the camera?"

"The metric in which you measure success is important," Longoria added.

 She said that studios  will pat themselves on the back, saying, "We’ve doubled the amount of women behind the camera!"  

Eva tells an inspiring story about Latinos, reflecting her own family's experiences, challenging Hollywood underestimation.

"28% of ticket buyers at the box office are Latino," she said. 

"Your film will not succeed if you don’t have the Latino audience.

 Why there's no content for us if we are the ticket buyers? If we are the viewers?

 If you don’t speak to us, we may not buy that  ticket."

"We’re still underrepresented in front and behind the camera, still not tapping into the females of  Latino community," she said. 

"Hollywood is so progressive is a myth when you look at the data."

"The reality is that we’re still far behind in equal representation."