Entertainment
Camila Mendes wants more films about the Brazilian American experience, so she produced one
Since booking her breakout role in The CW drama “Riverdale” in 2017, Camila Mendes has skyrocketed to fame as one the most prominent Brazilian American stars in Hollywood. Yet, despite building on her success with acclaimed projects such as Netflix’s “Do Revenge” and Hulu’s “Palm Springs,” the actor says she has yet to receive a single script calling for a Brazilian role. “I get asked to play everything under the sun, every different kind of Latina, except Brazilian,” she says.
That’s what drew her to her latest project, “Música,” a coming-of-age musical rom-com directed by and starring Rudy Mancuso that premiered this week at the South by Southwest Film and TV Festival. “Música” tells the story of Rudy, an aspiring artist trying to navigate his future as he’s pulled in different directions by his overbearing mother (Maria Mancuso), his girlfriend Haley (Francesca Reale) and his new crush, Isabella (Mendes). It’s a charming, unorthodox musical that doesn’t feature traditional musical numbers. Instead, drawing on Rudy’s synesthesia, the film bursts to life in sequences where the surrounding environment — a nearby basketball game, kids playing jump rope, a lively game of checkers at the park — all become part of a symphony.
Mendes was hesitant about the project at first — Mancuso was a first-time director, and he had initially risen to fame on YouTube and Vine. But, her reservations melted away when she spoke with Mancuso and learned how passionate he was about getting the film made, as well as his desire to expose more audiences to the Brazilian American experience. “Deep down, I think I always knew I was going to take the role,” she says. “How could I say no to this opportunity?”
The film’s on-screen love story evolved into a real one off-screen, with Mancuso and Mendes celebrating their one-year anniversary last July. “Música” will be available to stream on Prime Video on April 4.
“Música” is the second rom-com you’ve starred in and produced this year. Is that something you want to do more of?
The rom-com thing is completely coincidental. [Laughs] It’s funny, because I know that “Música” is technically a rom-com, but to me, it didn’t feel like any rom-com I’d seen before, so I never categorized it that way in my head.
When you hear “musical,” I’m sure a lot of people start imagining structured song and dance numbers, which is very different from what we see in “Música.” What convinced you to sign on?
Rudy’s team sent me the script with a kind of sizzle reel — basically a short version of the opening scene — just to give an example of the vision. It would say in the action “It breaks into a musical number with people banging on pots and pans,” but you don’t know what that actually looks like without an example. That got me excited, but also, I was skeptical. I didn’t know much about Rudy. I just knew that he was a Viner, so I had my own preconceived notions of what that meant, and I was also just in my head about my career choices at the time. But I decided to meet with him because I wanted to meet a fellow Brazilian in the industry, and he was obviously very talented. When I met with him, I was floored. I knew I needed to work with him, but I also knew I had to produce this. It was the only way I would sign on, because I had notes about my character, Isabella.
What stood out to you that you wanted to change?
Well, I really wanted to develop not just my character, but the other female role, Haley. I wanted to make sure they felt fully realized and complete. Rudy was like, “Absolutely, that’s part of the reason we want you on board.” So over the course of a few months, I would Zoom with him to work on scenes and dialogue and make sure, especially for Haley’s role, that she wasn’t just the rich white girl, that we weren’t making their dynamic so binary. Then obviously, we personalized my role and gave her a little bit more of a backstory.
Why was creating that backstory important to you?
With love stories, you really need to understand the conflict. What is it about Isabella that interests him, and what is it about him that triggers Isabella? I wanted her to be authentic, so what ended up happening was that I brought some of my own struggles to the role in order to kind of find her as a character.
Beyond you and Isabella sharing the same Brazilian American background, what were some of those personal elements that bled into the character?
I mean, it’s exaggerated and not necessarily a mirror of what my upbringing was like, but a little bit of her backstory. I can say this now because we’ve talked about it and we have a great relationship, but when I was finishing up high school, my mother moved back to Brazil to live with a guy she was seeing. My parents were divorced and I went to move in with my dad. During that time, I remember having gone through my first heartbreak as a kid and really wishing my mother was there. I remember as a teenager that absence and that feeling of abandonment. I thought that was a good thing to incorporate into Isabella’s character because you have Rudy’s character who’s so annoyed by his mother’s love and overwhelmed with how involved she is in his life. I think it’s nice to have a character like Isabella who’s like, “Actually, I wish my mom was more involved in my life.” I just took that one little thing from way back in the day and kind of pulled from that so that I had an avenue into her character and her pain.
How did it impact you finally getting to play a character who spoke to some of your experiences?
I think story-wise, the emphasis on family in Brazilian culture is something that I’ve really grown to embrace more. Especially now dating a Brazilian, it’s opened me up to that perspective of really putting more of an effort and to stay close to family to see them more. Obviously, being in Hollywood for so long, you can get so career focused and make everything about success. But the older you get, the more you realize that’s really not what matters. I want to be able to look back on my life and feel like I created strong relationships with the people that I love. And I think this movie has a really strong message with that.
This is the second project out this year that you’ve worked on as an actor and a producer, what motivated you to step into that role?
I think producing for me was a way to make sure that I was protected. Especially coming from a teen show, I’m so cautious with who I work with and I want to make sure that they’re going to represent me well. That’s a big fear that I have, because when you’re on a show, you work with a new director every episode and you have very little control of the outcome. You might watch an episode and see that they cut it in a certain way and now you look like a bad actor. You feel like you’re being misrepresented. So for me, my avenue into producing was trying to take control and having creative authority and protecting myself. That’s evolved to be a deeper passion and love for the art of producing as a whole but that’s definitely how it started.
As a producer, you have a whole new layer of interest vested into this story than you did as an actor. What do you hope people take away from their experience watching “Música?”
From a personal standpoint, I’m very excited for people to see what Rudy is capable of. I know that there’s such a stigma around being an internet personality and having your talent undermined. So I’m just so excited for people to see just how creative and visionary he is.
But I’m also excited for people to get a glance into Brazilian culture, because there’s truly no movies representing Brazilian culture right now. And there’s something even more nuanced about “Música” in the sense that it’s Brazilian American, which I think is accessible to a lot of children of immigrants. You don’t have to just be Brazilian to relate to the story. Anybody who feels the duality of being an immigrant child, having one culture passed down to them but living an entirely different one, knows that clash of ideologies can be so difficult to navigate. Seeing Rudy navigate those dualities was refreshing because I’m navigating the same one. It’s been really great to have somebody who understands my experience, so I hope that there are people watching this movie that will also relate and feel seen.
Was part of your motivation for getting into producing wanting to expand Brazilian representation in the industry?
Oh, absolutely. I just don’t think there are enough people behind the camera creating that platform, so I just feel very lucky that I get to be part of the beginning of it. I kept telling Rudy, Brazilians need to have their “Crazy Rich Asians” moment, where resilience can finally feel seen.
How do you hope “Música” plays a role in expanding people’s awareness of Brazilian culture and the Brazilian American experience?
On a very, very microscopic level, I think it would be great if it helped people learn that Brazilians speak Portuguese. [Laughs] That would be a big win for us. But also, Brazilian culture is so beautiful, and it’s never showcased in a romantic way. I think a lot of people’s exposure to Brazil in film is like “City of God”-type violence. That is part of the Brazilian story, but it’s just one aspect. There’s this whole other side to it that isn’t really celebrated in film. I’m excited for people to hopefully recognize that.
The sixth outing in the director’s chair for filmmaker Kirk Jones, I Swear dramatizes the real-life story of touretter John Davidson (played by Robert Aramayo). Tourette’s Syndrome, for those unfamiliar with the condition, is a nervous system disorder that causes various tics, the most prolific being erratic and explicit language. However, as I Swear expertly showcases, the syndrome is far more than ill-timed outbursts of curse words. Davidson’s story is one of societal frustration, finding your people (both with and without the condition), and using your voice to help others rise. The subject and subject matter are handled with absolute care and understanding under Kirk’s measured vision and Robert Aramayo’s BAFTA-winning performance.
The film kicks off with the greatest exclamation to democracy ever uttered (*%#! the Queen!), as a nervous John Davidson prepares himself before entering an awards ceremony hosted by Britain’s royal family. Right away, the film tells us what it is: a triumph over adversity that blends humor and human drama with education. It’s an important setup, as the film flashes back to Davidson’s 1980s youth, where we see his time as a star soccer recruit flatline as his condition takes hold. Davidson’s life spirals from there. Some aspects, like school bullying and accidental run-ins with authority figures, are expected but important to empathizing with young Davidson’s (young version, played with heart by Scott Ellis Watson) new everyday life. The more tragic, a complete meltdown of his family system, is unsettling if quick. His father (Steven Cree) is never given enough screen time to explore his alcohol coping tendencies. However, his mother Heather’s descent into easy fixes and blaming is crushing and convincing. Harry Potter series actress Shirley Henderson (Moaning Myrtle) gives a layered performance as Heather. Someone who loves her son, but also feels cursed by him as the entire family exits the picture. It’s bitter, she’s tired, and fills each conversation with ‘only medication and your mother can save you’ energy.
From there, the viewer and Davidson find refuge in a host of characters. Maxine Peake plays Dottie, the mother of a childhood friend and a retired mental health nurse. Screen vet Peter Mullan plays maintenance man Tommy Trotter. Together, they help Davidson build a life and an understanding of himself that carries the film forward into its second half. After that, the film is primarily a 3-actor show as director Kirk fills the screen with these tour-de-force performances. Peake and Mullan are great vessels to get the film’s main message across: patience, love, and a shared responsibility between the diagnosed and those who understand their struggle can help change the path for people quickly left behind by a normative world. Together, they are the soul of the movie, with the filmmakers clearly hoping the audience will follow their lead after they exit the theater (in my case, the beautiful Oriental Theater for the Milwaukee Film Festival). Both performances are perfectly warm and reflective and shouldn’t be left out in discussions of I Swear.
I say this because the movie is anchored by The Rings of Power actor Robert Aramayo, who leaves Elrond’s elf ears behind to bring an acute naturalism to his performance of main character John Davidson. Aramayo’s physicality and timing of the fitful Tourettes Syndrome never feel out of place or overplayed. In fact, the movie as a whole does an amazing job of never veering into sentimentality. While many moviegoers left with tissues dabbing their eyes, the filmmaking never felt like it was forcing that reaction out of audiences. It straddles the line between feel-good and reality with every story beat and lands squarely on the side of letting the real inform our feelings. Anyone with an ounce of empathy will grasp the film’s message and hopefully take it with them into life.
I Swear continues at the Milwaukee Film Festival on Tuesday, April 21st, and releases nationwide April 24th, 2026, courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics.
Several private equity firms and Hollywood power players, including United Talent Agency and longtime agent Patrick Whitesell, have expressed interest in buying parts of Casey Wasserman’s music and sports management firm after it abruptly went up for sale.
Wasserman became ensnared in controversy earlier this year after his salacious decades-old emails to Ghislaine Maxwell, an accomplice of child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, were released as part of the U.S. Justice Department’s trove of Epstein files.
The agency auction is in the early stages, according to three people close to the process but not authorized to comment.
Earlier this week, several interested parties submitted proposals to meet a preliminary deadline in the auction, two of the sources said.
The company, which changed its name to the Team last month, is expected to be valued at around $3 billion.
Providence Equity Partners holds the majority stake. The private equity firm has discussed selling the entire company or carving off Wasserman’s minority interest. Providence also has considered selling the bulk of the firm and staying on as a minority investor, one of the sources said. Another scenario could involve separating, then selling the individual business units that make up the Team.
Wasserman and Providence’s company boasts an enviable roster of music artists, including Kendrick Lamar, Coldplay and Ed Sheeran. Its sports marketing practice is viewed as particularly lucrative and has potential to grow in value as big dollars flow into sports that draw large crowds.
Wasserman, who declined to comment, has a veto right over any sale of the company that he has spent a quarter of a century building.
UTA, which also declined to comment, is among the most aggressive suitors, the sources said. The Team’s sports marketing and music representation divisions would dramatically boost the Beverly Hills agency’s profile and client roster.
Whitesell, former executive chairman of Endeavor, separately has been motivated to make investments in sports, media and entertainment since last year when he left the talent agency that he and Ari Emanuel built. Whitesell launched a new firm with seed money from private equity firm Silver Lake, and last spring he started WIN Sports Group to represent professional football players.
Whitesell wasn’t immediately available for comment.
European investment firm Permira also has expressed interest, according to a knowledgeable source. Permira declined to comment.
The New York Times first reported that Permira, UTA and Whitesell had expressed interest.
The sales process is expected to stretch into summer, the knowledgeable people said. The auction could become complicated particularly if Providence decides to unwind the business.
For example, UTA could not buy the entire company because of the Brillstein television unit. The agency is bound by an agreement with the Writers Guild of America that prevents it from owning television production.
Investment bank Moelis & Company is managing the sale. A representative of the firm declined comment.
Wasserman also is the chairman of LA28, the nonprofit group that will be staging the Summer Olympics in Los Angeles in two years.
Following revelations of Wasserman’s 2003 emails with Maxwell, several musicians and athletes — led by pop artist Chappell Roan and soccer star Abby Wambach — said that, to stay true to their values, they would leave the agency then known as Wasserman.
Wasserman apologized to his staff for “past personal mistakes” and said he would sell the agency.
He had limited dealings with Epstein, flying on the financier’s jet along with former President Clinton for a September 2002 humanitarian trip through Africa.
Wasserman, a prolific Clinton fundraiser whose legendary grandfather, Hollywood titan Lew Wasserman, helped the Democrat win the 1992 presidential election, was joined on Epstein’s jet by his then-wife, Laura, actor Kevin Spacey, Epstein, Maxwell — who was convicted of sexual abuse in 2021 — and others, including security agents.
The LA28 board’s executive committee unanimously voted to keep Wasserman as chairman, citing his “strong leadership” of the Games.
Pizza Movie (2026) Director: Nick Kocher and Brian McElhaney, Star: Gaten Matarazzo and Sean Giambrone
Somehow, I got through an hour of this movie. I was seconds away from turning off in the first fifteen minutes because of the juvenile humor. Pizza Movie is too silly, repetitive, and the characters are annoying. Stranger Things Gaten Matarazzo and Sean Giambrone star as college friends, Jack and Montgomery. College angles are rarely seen in films right now, and that’s the one saving grace of the film. Similar to high school, people are also trying to fit in. The story and visuals were too corny. You can only watch someone’s head exploding for so long without letting yours.
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie (2026) Director: Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, Stars: Chris Pratt, Charlie Day, Anya Taylor-Joy
I never saw the first Super Mario Brothers Movie when it was out, but I heard it got positive reviews. My brother always loved playing Super Mario video games as a kid, and I’d watch him. I tagged along with my friends to see Super Mario Galaxy Movie, and it’s a cute and fun film. I like it when movies explore the video game world. The animation creates unique worlds and characters. The characters are split into their own storylines, and for me, I felt like it worked. It adds more action, especially for kids who are seeing the films.
Emily in Paris Season 5 (2025) Creator: Darren Star, Stars: Lily Collins and Ashley Park
After a bright spot in season 4, I thought season 5 of Emily in Paris would continue its growth in the story and its protagonist, but no, it’s all drained out in the usual Emily (Lily Collins) mishaps. Ashley Park (Mindy) has become too good for this show. Emily and Mindy waste several opportunities because of their love lives. The whole relationship angle is ruining it. I don’t understand why Alfie (Lucien Laviscount) is still in the show. I thought writers learned their lesson, but by the last episode, they’re continuing to bring the past into an apparent season 6.
Sarah’s Oil (2025) Director: Cyrus Nowrasteh, Stars: Naya Desir-Johnson and Zachary Levi
There’s always history lurking right beneath our noses. Sarah’s Oil (2025) tells the true story of Sarah Rector, an Oklahoma-born African American girl who became the first black female millionaire in the U.S. Naya Desir-Johnson is fierce and driven as Sarah. Zachary Levi is also along for the ride as Bert, a man who helps Sarah. Kate (Bridget Regan) was another favorite character as an intelligent woman. Cyrus Nowrasteh was drawn to the subject for its story and its themes. Nowrasteh’s direction is compelling as he unearths a hidden story from history. The film is streaming on Amazon Prime.
Jack Goes Boating (2014) Director and Star: Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Ryan
Jack Goes Boating (2014) didn’t quite work for me, largely because of its slow pace and uneven storytelling. The film stars the late Seymour Hoffman as Jack, who also directed the film. This was Hoffman’s first and only time in the directing chair. Amy Ryan also stars in the film, giving a solid performance. This was also based on a play that Hoffman starred in. Jack wants to participate in a swim championship. That’s hardly what the film is about, tracking other characters’ stories. While the film aims for quiet intimacy, it ultimately drags, making it an underwhelming viewing experience.
You Kill Me (2016), Director: John Dahl, Stars: Ben Kingsley, Tea Leoni, Luke Wilson
Meet You Kill Me (2016), yet another film that I found in the museum of underrated gems. The concept revolves around Frank (Ben Kingsley), a hitman, who is sent to an A.A. meeting to get his mind focused again. A different story happens, where Frank falls in love with Laurel (Tea Leoni). Leoni is one of my favorite actresses. It also stars the funny Luke Wilson. I liked the trio’s dynamics. You Kill Me is a mental health movie. It’s okay to make changes if you’re not happy. I recommended that you keep an eye out for this movie.
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