John Alberto Leguizamo said he will not watch the new Super Mario Bros. movie because ‘they messed up the inclusion.’
The 62-year-old actor is famous for his roles in The Pest, Romeo + Juliet, John Wick, Spawn, Ice Age, Encanto, The Menu, Critical Thinking, Super Mario Bros. (1993), Empire, and Die Hard 2.
Recently, he spoke to TMZ for an interview and doubled down on his criticism of the new Super Mario Bros. film due to the casting.
“No, I will not [be watching]. They could’ve included a Latin character. Like I was groundbreaking, and then they stopped the groundbreaking. They messed up the inclusion. They dis-included. Just cast some Latin folk! We’re 20% of the population. The largest people of color group, and we are underrepresented,” he said.
Last year in October, the comedian spoke out against the animated movie for the first time and criticized the makers for going ‘all white’ with the cast.
“Too bad they went all white! No Latinx in the leads! Groundbreaking color-blind casting in original! Plus I’m the only one who knows how to make this movie work script-wise!” he wrote on Twitter.
Then in November, the actor spoke to IndieWire and called the new film “backward.”
“I’m O.G. A lot of people love the original. I did Comic-Con in New York and in Baltimore, and everyone’s like, ‘No, no, we love the old one, the original.’ They’re not feeling the new one.’ I’m not bitter. It’s unfortunate.”
“The directors Annabel Jankel and Rocky Morton fought really hard for me to be the lead because I was a Latin man, and they [the studio] didn’t want me to be the lead,” John added. “They fought really hard, and it was such a breakthrough. For them to go backwards and not cast another [actor of color] kind of sucks.”
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