Eva Longoria on directing Flamin’ Hot: ‘Everybody needs to know this story’

When Eva Longoria read the script for her feature directorial debut, she was confused as to why she hadn’t heard the story before.

Eva Longoria makes her feature directorial debut with Flamin’ Hot. Picture: Robin L Marshall/Getty Images

What you may not know about actor Eva Longoria is that she’s an accomplished presence behind the camera as well as in front.

Longoria has been directing TV since a 2014 episode of Devious Maids, a primetime soap from longtime collaborator Marc Cherry, the creator of Desperate Housewives. But she hasn’t, until now, taken the reins on a feature.

That changed with Flamin’ Hot, a biographical dramedy about Richard Montanez, a Mexican-American immigrant who claimed to have invented Flamin’ Cheetos, and rose from the floors of a Frito Lay factory where he worked as a janitor to one of its top marketing executives.

It’s a feel-good underdog success story, and it’s one Longoria knew she could tell through her own experiences and her lens.

The actor and filmmaker sat down with news.com.au about working on Richard Montanez, and how his story relates to her life.

This is your first feature, your directorial debut. Had you been looking for a project for a long time?

No, this story found me. I have been directing TV for over a decade and my agent sent me the script and I was blown away by the story. And I was confused because I did not know this story. This guy is Mexican-American and I’m Mexican-American. Everybody needs to know this story.

Producer DeVon Franklin and actor Jesse Garcia with Eva Longoria on the set of Flamin’ Hot. Picture: Anna Koori’s/Searchlight

After that, I felt this insane need to direct it. It didn’t even faze me that it was a feature. I didn’t think about it as my feature debut, none of that. I just thought of it as, ‘I’d love to get this job and see what I could do with this’.

Did you have to bang on a few doors or were they pretty easy conversations?

Developing a pitch for a film takes months and a lot of work, practice and a vision. But I had a very clear vision and I don’t have a problem working hard. Convincing them I can do the job was the easy part. I will sell you on me any day.

[The studio] Searchlight got it pretty quickly. They were like, ‘Oh, OK, that’s the film’.

You mentioned how crazy it was you didn’t know this story because of your shared background with the real Richard Montanez. What do you think your lived experience and cultural heritage added to the film that maybe a non-Mexican-American director could’ve have understood?

Authenticity was my north star of making this film. This is the community, I knew it was my superpower. You know, Richard sounds like my dad and he looks like my uncle. Judy looks like my mum. This was a family I knew.

Also, I am Richard Montanez. I’ve been told, ‘No, don’t do that, no, ideas that come from people like you’. Richard dared to say, ‘But, why not?’. That cultural specificity is what broadens the movie.

Flamin’ Hot is on Disney+. Picture: Searchlight

I think we’re in a moment where being specific doesn’t take away from how people relate to a story. Yes, it’s a Mexican-American story but there are a lot of things in the film that people from other cultural backgrounds or from those socioeconomic groups will recognise and go, ‘that was my story’.

Because it’s also an underdog story. Thematically, it’s about what happens when opportunity is not distributed equally, and affects everybody.

The fact Richard went from janitor to marketing executive is incredible, and I found myself very engrossed in it. But there are some disputes around his claims about inventing the Flamin’ Cheetos. How do you navigate that debate when you’re promoting it?

It doesn’t really come up because we never set out to tell the history of the Flamin’ Cheetos. We are telling the story of Richard Montanez, the true story of Richard Montanez. And this is his truth. That’s why the movie is totally from his point of view, we are inside his mind.

I remember the first time I met Richard, and he is so funny. And he’ll tell you he’s the most uneducated [person]. But he’s the smartest, most uneducated person you’ll meet. He’s kind of like an oxymoron.

He has such a unique tone, he’s funny and witty but yet he’s serious. I said, ‘The movie has to be in his voice’. He told me a story of how he thought a boardroom was a room full of boards. And that’s how we came up with those fantasy sequences.

I love that we had the creative liberty to play with all that stuff, because we were in his point of view.

Flamin’ Hot is told through the perspective of Richard Montanez. Picture: Emily Aragones/Searchlight

So, the movie’s not about a chemist in the [American] Midwest who comes up with the chemical. This movie’s always been about Ricky Montanez and his childhood and his upbringing and his relationship with his father.

For me, it hasn’t really affected the movie at all.

How is Richard’s story in conversation with our lives today?

I was exploring how opportunities are not distributed equally. I think a lot of countries are going through that today. You know, talent is everywhere but is there an infrastructure to get you from one place to the next?

If you want to move up in life, you need economic mobility. ‘I went to college, I got my degree, why isn’t there a job waiting for me?’ Only student debt. There are definitely thematic things that I think all countries can relate to.

Flamin’ Hot is streaming now on Disney+

Edited for clarity and length