Zoe Saldaña doesn’t believe that ‘Emilia Pérez’ is racist – but others do

When drug cartel transgender musical Emilia Pérez was nominated for multiple Oscars, it immediately became a lightening rod for controversy.

Audiences didn’t respond Emilia Pérez like the Academy had —they found it offensive to Mexican people and transgender people. Emilia Pérez star Karla Sofía Gascón was revealed to have made multiple hurtful and racist tweets before coming to international attention. It was a mess.

Mexican people especially have been furious about the way their country was portrayed in Emilia Pérez and furious that French director Jacques Audiard seemed to have such disdain for their culture. In fact, a group of Mexican creatives even made their own parody, Johanne Sacreblu, where the characters are French stereotypes. One of these creatives is Mexican writer Héctor Guillén, who made a post in January pointing out the number of unacknowledged drug war victims in Emilia Pérez and calling the film a “racist Eurocentric mockery.”

Zoe Saldaña isn’t engaging with criticisms

Emilia Pérez didn’t exactly clean up at the Oscars, but Zoe Saldaña did take home Best Supporting Actress for her role as Rita Mora Castro. In the press room, she was asked by a Mexican press outlet about the Mexican reaction to the movie, with the journalist pointing out that the movie was “really hurtful for us Mexicans,” and the actress gave a disappointing response.

“First of all, I’m very, very sorry that you and so many Mexicans felt offended. That was never our intention. We spoke from a place of love,” Saldaña said. “But I don’t share your opinion. For me, the heart of this movie was not Mexico.”

“Sorry that you felt offended,” is not an apology, and it gets worse from there. “We weren’t making a film about a country; we were making a film about four women,” Saldaña said. “They could have been Russian, they could have been Dominican, they could have been Black, from Detroit, they could have been from Israel, they could have been from Gaza.” This is a spectacularly tone-deaf comment to make. “These women are all very universal women, trying to survive every day, trying to survive systemic oppression… So I will stand by that.”

Saldaña then said she would be willing to “sit down with all of my Mexican brothers and sisters, with love and respect, and have a conversation about how Emilia could’ve been done better.” Saldaña hasn’t really shown any inclination to engage with the criticisms as of yet: why start now?

This isn’t the first time Saldaña has found herself in hot water over racism. In 2016 she darkened her skin and wore a prosthetic nose to play Nina Simone in a biopic, an act that met with a lot of criticism. Eventually, she regretted the role intensely. In 2020 she said in an Instagram interview with Steven Canals, “I’m so sorry. I know better today and I’m never going to do that again.”

One wonders if she’s going to be saying the same thing about Emilia Pérez in a decade or so.