Woman: Plato once said, “He who controls the narrative can control society.”
I-I’m learning.
[ Laughter ] I love my Greeks.
So NGLmitu is all about that mission.
And that’s why I’ve been so proud to be a part of this team since day one.
Latin people and Latin talent is killing it.
It’s important for Latinx people to tell their own stories because it’s going to have an authenticity and it’s going to have a specificity that — that makes it real, and everybody sees that.
We’re talking about taking charge of our storytelling, which is lacking thereof everywhere, where 20% of the US population, less than 1% of the story is being told in streaming networks and movies.
So we got a studio, we got staff, we got talent, and we’re creating content.
It’s a dual thing that we Latinx who are in America are doing because we’re loyal to our old culture, but we love our new culture and we love American culture.
It’s like a trifecta.
It merges all inside of us.
[ Speaking Spanish ] And he said she’s having a bad dream.
[ Spanish ] But don’t worry, it’s diet.
You know white people don’t really code switch, but we code switch because, you know, we have to have different languages for different folks.
Woman: Go heat up your abuela’s cooking because we’re about to chop it up.
[ Indistinct ] Woman: Our two companies, you know, coming together is very exciting.
NGL has always serviced largely the advertiser community, had an incredibly powerful media network for disseminating different advertising messages and media.
Mitu has built its brand in a more consumer facing way on social media and digital platforms through different lifestyle brands.
Your stories matter and your talent matters, and there is a place for it, and there is increasingly communities to support that.
And we hope that Mitu is going to be just one of those and we welcome there being others.
We want to collaborate and, you know, expand this mission beyond just — just us Having our amazing 14,000 square foot studio space in L.A., you know, we really want that to be a beacon for the community.
We have opened that up.
We’ve had mentorship programs run through there and we want to continue to do more of that.
We want to open up to local, you know, students to come by.
We’ve talked about doing workshops.
[ Singing in Spanish ] I consider myself in that same generation, right?
I was born and raised here, spoke Spanish first.
But as soon as you go to school, English takes over, You become English dominant.
And, you know, the majority of our audience is fully bilingual.
Que lo que, which pretty much means, “What’s up?”
Hey, Ruben!
Que lo que?
Yeah.
I mean, he gets it.
You know?
What made me feel so special in it finding its niche was that it was not about you don’t fully belong here because you’re a little different and you don’t fully belong there because you’re a little different.
It was like, no, you can be 100% of each one.
You can fully embrace it.
You’re a 200 percenter, was, you know, the term that became coined by Mitu.
So that it’s an additive thing.
It’s empowering.
It’s not something you have to hide or suppress.
There is something so special to holding on to that culture.
It really gives people that permission and that key is to, like, fully bask in it.
And that’s what we want to see more of, you know?
Remove some of those barriers, remove some of that mystery and, you know, be our own green light.
And then we have the platform in which to disseminate it, we’re more and more in control of that destination.
We need to open doors and we need to be a company that — that really helps the next generation.
We can’t just be about what we’re doing now.
We need to be looking forward.
It’s about not giving up and really having a clear goal and a dream that you can strive for.
And that’s the kind of advice I give when I speak to — to the next generation of younger filmmakers.
I always just say, half of it is not giving up and just sticking around.
And then of course, the rest of it is talent and luck and a little bit of this, but it’s a lot of hard work, is really the secret formula.
There’s no — there’s no shortcut to that.
This is not about excluding other people or doing it at the detriment of others.
We want everybody to celebrate and we want everybody to have their own kind of community shine.
It’s just for us, this is what we’re doing to make our Latinidad shine.
We have our own projects and things that we’re greenlighting now within NGLmitu.
And I think this is really only the beginning.
Leguizamo: We Latin people in this country are the oldest, largest ethnic group in America and we contribute $2.7 trillion to the U.S. economy every year.
And yet we’re not in the corporate boards, we’re not in boardrooms, we’re not in executives’ offices.
And that needs to change, and it needs to change now.
And that’s what we’re advocating for, change all across America.
Man: Francisco Miranda, who fought for American independence, should have a big statue next to Washington and his.
That’s right, where is that damn statue?
Vigil: John is just a legend in the industry.
I mean, we’re so fortunate to have him as part of the company.
He is absolutely a powerhouse and being able to advocate for the community and hold people accountable.
We are starting to see some of that change.
You know, not as fast as we want.
Leguizamo: When we did “Encanto,” we had a Latin director, Latin writer, Latin supervisor, we had Latin talent — Lin-Manuel Miranda — and it became one of the biggest hits Disney has ever had.
So, I love what this is doing because, you know, the digital revolution, democratized sort of viewing, so now you can find a lot of Latin content.
We are getting millions of hits, but the studios aren’t bringing their stories up, aren’t putting them in movies.
They’re doing it with white counterparts, but not with Latinx counterparts who are getting the same millions of hits.
So we’re doing that.
Don’t accept rejection.
Don’t accept no for an answer.
Take matters into your own hands.
♪♪ ♪♪
