Backstage With… Eva Longoria on her feature film directorial debut Flamin’ Hot
Have you ever wanted to watch a film based on crisps? Well, that’s exactly the basis of Eva Longoria’s feature directorial debut.
Flamin’ Hot tells the story of Richard Montañez, a janitor at Frito-Lay who helps establish the Flamin’ Hot Cheetos brand and climbs his way up the ladder to become an executive at the company.
The screenplay is based on Montañez’s memoir – A Boy, A Burrito And A Cookie – and stars Jesse Garcia as the potato chip pioneer, Annie Gonzalez as his wife Judy, Dennis Haysbert as Frito-Lay production manager Clarence C Baker and four-time Emmy Award winner Tony Shalhoub as PepsiCo chief executive Roger Enrico.
DeVon Franklin, Jesse Garcia, and Eva Longoria on the set of Flamin’ Hot. Pic: Searchlight Pictures.
Pic: Searchlight Pictures
Filmed in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 2021, Eva Longoria says she “went in and fought for the job” after reading the script and became “obsessed” with becoming the person to tell the story.
“It’s a pretty powerful story,” she tells Sky News’ Backstage podcast. “I read it. I was blown away by Richard Montañez’s life, and I was like, ‘How do I not know this story?’ He’s Mexican-American, he’s from my community, I’m Mexican-American – everybody needs to know this story.”
Longoria has spent the past 10 years directing TV, an experience that she says prepared her for the film’s quick eight-week schedule.
Pic: Searchlight Pictures
The production employed around 204 New Mexican crew members, 44 New Mexican principal cast members and 875 extras of New Mexican background.
Longoria says she saw Flamin’ Hot as a chance to straighten out misconceptions about the Hispanic community and the way Mexican-Americans live.
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“I think there’s obviously stereotypes that have been about our community for so long, but also because we don’t get many movies like this,” she says, adding that “Hollywood gets to define what a hero is”.
“I had the opportunity to create a hero and I wanted him to look like Richard Montañez. I wanted him to be brown. I wanted him to sound like my dad. And I want our community specifically to be able to look up onscreen and go, ‘Wow, that guy did all that’.”
Montañez and his contested version of events
Richard Montañez was born in an east Los Angeles barrio community to Mexican-American parents in the late 1950s.
Pic: Searchlight Pictures
He worked as a janitor at a California Frito-Lay factory when he says he conceived “his life-changing idea” to create and market a snack targeted to the Mexican-American community.
Just before filming for Longoria’s Flamin’ Hot began, the LA Times published an article seemingly refuting Montañez’s claims that he invented the Flamin’ Hot Cheeto.
Pic: Searchlight Pictures.
Frito-Lay told the paper that “none of our records show that Richard was involved in any capacity in the Flamin’ Hot test market”, adding: “We have interviewed multiple personnel who were involved in the test market, and all of them indicate that Richard was not involved in any capacity in the test market.”
When asked if it had an impact on her directorial decisions, Longoria says: “No, it had zero impact on the movie.
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‘This is his truth and this movie is true’
“I never wanted to do the documentary of The Flaming Hot Cheeto and how it was invented. I’ve always wanted to tell the true story of Richard Montañez, and his story is fascinating. His life is fascinating.”
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Longoria says he “just happened to have a hand in creating the number one snack in the world, which is a multibillion-dollar product”.
Pic: Searchlight Pictures
Pic: Searchlight Pictures
The script for the Disney+ film was rewritten to be from the perspective of Montañez and to include fantasy sequences, allowing the viewer to see “what was happening and what he felt happened”.
Longoria says it allowed them to have more creative freedom to tell the story and Montañez’s version of events.
“This is his truth, and this movie is true. So, yeah, that never really affected the script. The script was always what it was. It was always Richard’s story,” she says.
Richard Montañez has since retired from his executive position at Frito-Lay and has become an author and motivational speaker.
Flamin’ Hot is available to stream now on Disney+
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Joy star James Norton on the ‘postcode lottery’ of IVF – and playing the scientist who was part of creating the first ‘test-tube baby’
Actor James Norton, who stars in a new film telling the story of the world’s first “test-tube baby”, has criticised how “prohibitively expensive” IVF can be in the UK.
In Joy, the star portrays the real-life scientist Bob Edwards, who – along with obstetrician Patrick Steptoe and embryologist Jean Purdy – spent a decade tirelessly working on medical ways to help infertility.
The film charts the 10 years leading up to the birth of Louise Joy Brown, who was dubbed the world’s first test-tube baby, in 1978.
In the UK, statistics show the proportion of IVF cycles paid for by the NHS has dropped from 40% to 27% in the last decade
Norton, who is best known for playing Tommy Lee Royce in the BAFTA-winning series Happy Valley, told Sky News he has friends who were IVF babies and other friends who have had their own children thanks to the fertility treatment.
“But I didn’t know about these three scientists and their sacrifice, tenacity and skill,” he said. The star hopes the film will be “a catalyst for conversation” about the treatment and its availability.
“We know for a fact that Jean, Bob and Patrick would not have liked the fact that IVF is now so means based,” he said. “It’s prohibitively expensive for some… and there is a postcode lottery which means that some people are precluded from that opportunity.”
Bill Nighy, Thomasin McKenzie and James Norton star in Joy. All pics: Netflix/ Kerry Brown
Now, IVF is considered a wonder of modern medicine. More than 12 million people owe their existence today to the treatment Edwards, Steptoe and Purdy worked so hard to devise.
But Joy shows how public backlash in the years leading up to Louise’s birth saw the team vilified – accused of playing God and creating “Frankenstein babies”.
Bill Nighy and Thomasin McKenzie star alongside Norton, with the script written by acclaimed screenwriter Jack Thorne and his wife Rachel Mason.
The couple went through seven rounds of IVF themselves to conceive their son.
Norton portrays scientist Bob Edwards, while McKenzie plays embryologist Jean Purdy
While the film is set in the 1970s, the reality is that societal pressures haven’t changed all that much for many going through IVF today – with the costs now both emotional and financial.
“IVF is still seen as a luxury product, as something that some people get access to and others don’t,” said Thorne, speaking about their experiences in the UK.
“Louise was a working-class girl with working-class parents. Working class IVF babies are very, very rare now.”
In the run-up to the US election, Donald Trump saw IVF as a campaigning point – promising his government, or insurance companies, would pay for the treatment for all women should he be elected. He called himself the “father of IVF” at a campaign event – a remark described as “quite bizarre” by Kamala Harris.
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“I don’t think Trump is a blueprint for this,” Norton said. “I don’t know how that fits alongside his questions around pro-choice.”
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In the UK, statistics from fertility regulator HEFA show the proportion of IVF cycles paid for by the NHS has dropped from 40% to 27% in the last decade.
“It’s so expensive,” Norton said. “Those who want a child should have that choice… and some people’s lack of access to this incredibly important science actually means that people don’t have the choice.”
Joy is in UK cinemas from 15 November, and on Netflix from 22 November
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