Demian Bichir on the Power of Film and Telling the Immigrant Story Steve Fisher - Fusion
go to original January 16, 2014

A Better Life - Official Trailer (VISO Trailers)

The Hollywood actor pulled up to a stop light in downtown Los Angeles, and asked the man in an old pickup truck next to him a question. “Hey paisano, will you sell your truck?” The actor was Demián Bichir, one of Mexico’s most highly regarded and popular film stars, and he was trying to get a feel for his character in his then-upcoming film “A Better Life.”

That night the two came to an agreement. “I was driving that beat-up truck — really, really bad truck — for, I don’t know, maybe five months,” Bichir told an audience of 400 UC Berkeley students during a presentation in December.

He said driving the truck helped him better identify with his character, an unassuming gardener working in the posh neighborhoods of L.A.

“My paisanos, my fellow countrymen, they have this double, triple, difficult task to survive in this country because, first of all, you don’t have a face, you don’t have a name, you don’t exist basically.”

Best known for his roles in the 2008 movie "Che" and his Oscar-nominated turn in “A Better Life,” Bichir has also starred in the TV show “Weeds,” and is currently starring in the FX series “The Bridge.”

Read the rest at Fusion

We invite you to add your charity or supporting organizations' news stories and coming events to PVAngels so we can share them with the world. Do it now!