Casting for a new drama on ABC, The Death Of Eva Sofia Valdez is being announced now. If the show is any good, it will score big in the diversity department. The cast is lead by women – women of color at that.
The Death Of Eva Sofia Valdez is the creation of Cuban American Charise Castro Smith who is both writer and producer. The showrunners are female: Michele Fazekas and Tara Butters.
The absolutely fabulous Gina Torres is set for the title role. The Death Of Eva Sofia Valdez is described as “a sexy revenge drama with a supernatural twist and MacBeth with a Cuban twist. It centers on Eva Sofia Valdez, an immigrant who rose from rags to riches and is a celebrated Miami entrepreneur and a champion for immigrant rights. But the success of this modern-day Havana-born Cleopatra is fueled by an insatiable ambition that could destroy her family, a vendetta against the lover who betrayed her, and ghosts from the past who threaten to reveal the dark sacrifices Eva Sofia made to attain the American Dream.”
Gina Torres is Cuban American, so no whitewashing of the lead character. ABC will earn points for that. Not all the other players have actual Cuban cred in their background.
It’s about damn time Gina Torres got the leading role in a show. She’s been classing up everyone else’s shows for so long. At the same time, it’s sad that it didn’t happen until the leading character was clearly ethnic. Gina Torres could be the lead in anything.
Zabryna Guevara will play Teresa, Eva Sofia’s loving and bubbly younger sister, a Cuban immigrant who also worked her way up from poverty to a position of power and prosperity. Marta Milans will play Alegria, Eva Sofia’s daughter-in-law who has a pure heart and a sincere desire to do good in the world.
Angelica Celaya plays Dominique, a supernatural “shadow woman” who mysteriously enters Eva Sofia’s life.
Raúl Castillo plays Eva Sofia’s oldest son, Sebastian. Christian Ochoa will play Nicolas, the younger son.
Christina Pickles is also part of the cast, but I’m not sure what her role will be.
Like any early casting news reports, these individuals may change as they move closer to actually filming the pilot. I sincerely hope Gina Torres stays in the title role, and have high hopes that the series will be a great one.
Interesting! I hope the male characters aren’t bad-mouthed and badly representative, in the name of the beloved males in our families. Hollywood has been atrociously slanderous against the Black and Latino male image…sigh…
With a Cuban-American writer, maybe the representation won’t be so stereotypical, but more realistic. Fingers crossed.