In Ana Maria in Novela Land, twenty-something Ana Maria (Edy Ganem) is so bored with her life she keeps sabotaging it without thinking. After she gets fired from her job, bails on her best friend, and blows off her sister’s bridal fitting, Ana Maria gets into a fight with her mom (Elizabeth Peña) bout her lack of purpose. At the end of this horrible day, Ana Maria seeks solace by watching her favorite TV show, the Mexican telenovela Pasión Sin Limites (Passion Without Limits) which features a scheming seductress, Ariana Tomosa (also Edy Ganem). In the novela, Ariana is also having a bad episode, having just been blackmailed by the evil lawyer Schmidt (Luis Guzman) after being caught in a love triangle between the wealthy Eduardo (Juan Pablo Gamboa) and his sexy son Armando (Michael Steger). When both Ana Maria and Ariana simultaneously complain about their crummy lives, lightning strikes and the two women switch places. As a terrified Ariana slaps her way through the real world of Los Angeles, a liberated Ana Maria sleeps her way into big trouble. With the show hurtling towards its gripping finale, Ana Maria must figure out how she ended up in Novela Land before she is trapped inside her melodramatic fantasy forever. Ultimately, both women come to realize that faith in themselves is all they really needed to have the life they dreamed of.
I sat down with writer/director Georgina Garcia Riedel (How the Garcia Girls Spent Their Summer) and actress Edy Ganem (Devious Maids) in Los Angeles.
Danny Miller: Edy, that was a killer performance. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear that there were two different woman playing Ana Maria and Ariana.
Edy Ganem: I really appreciate that. It was so much fun to think about the differences of those two women and the worlds they came from.
Just the way you walked differently as Ana Maria and Ariana was hilarious.
Georgina Garcia Riedel: Edy came so prepared. She knew these women!
Did you both grow up watching telenovelas?
Edy: I definitely did! I grew up in Mexico watching them and when I think back on it now, some of them were on pretty late, I’m surprised my parents let me!
Oh, they’re not on in the daytime like American soaps?
Georgina: No. Some are in the afternoon but they’re more of an evening thing.
What do you think is the main difference between American soap operas and telenovelas?
Edy: One thing is that while American soaps can go on forever, our telenovelas always have an ending — most of them last under a year. But I also think the cultures they come from are very different. You come here and Americans are like, “Hey, what’s up, man?” and you keep your distance. You go to Mexico and people get super close to you and talk really loud and are much more dramatic! So our novelas are just bigger. I don’t think it means the acting is “cheesier,” it’s just very passionate — lots of big feelings.
That’s what I love about your performance of Ariana compared to Ana Maria — it’s just a completely different kind of acting. Wasn’t it more fun to play over-the-top Ariana?
It was, I have to admit! Where else can you go around yelling at everyone like that and slapping people?
On Devious Maids, you work with Susan Lucci, the former Queen of Soaps from her thirty-plus years as Erica Kane on All My Children. Did she give you any tips? I loved Susan’s performance on that show — I think Erica would feel very much at home in a telenovela.
I hate to say this, but I never really got to see Susan on All My Children.
Georgina: What? That’s insane! I used to love her on that show.
Edy: I know, it’s crazy! Everyone kept telling me that she was this bad girl who had 11 husbands but on our show she’s more like she is in real life — a very sweet, big-hearted woman.
I’ve interviewed some great actors such as Melissa Leo, Michael B. Jordan, and Josh Duhamel and we always end up talking about how they got their start on All My Children. Are telenovelas also that kind of training ground for a lot of actors?
Georgina: That kind of crossover is much more rare in the telenovela world. Salma Hayek started out on telenovelas, I think, but I can’t think of a lot of other people.
Edy: Yeah, I recently got to hang out with this guy who has done a lot of telenovelas and I asked him if he’s made any movies. He said, “Oh, the film people would never hire me!”
That sounds like the stigma TV actors used to have to deal with here.
Georgina: It will evolve.
Georgina, I love how when Ana Maria gets to the novela, she starts talking English and everyone just switches over. It’s really funny how you handled that.
Thank you for saying that! I spent a lot of time figuring that one out. I wanted it to feel very organic.
It’s funny how they all accept it, like they’re actors who have just been given new pages.
Edy: And that wonderful actress who plays the maid, Dyana Ortelli — you can see that she just thinks Ariana has had some kind of breakdown so they all just play along with her speaking English.
For me, the whole movie works on the literal level of these two women switching places and also on the level where Ana Maria IS having some kind of a breakdown because of her obsession with the show.
Georgina: Oh my God, I never thought about it that way, but I love that you got that from the movie.
Maybe because I know people who are obsessed with shows to that degree! I also love that this movie is NOT about the girl getting the hot guy.
Thank you! I was very happy when I realized it would pass the Bechdel test.
Edy: What’s that?
Georgina: It’s this thing that looks at gender bias in movies and books. One of the big questions is when you have two female characters in a room — are they spending most of their time talking about a man? And that’s not what’s happening in this film at all. I read so many scripts that are supposedly female-centric but the women are always talking about getting some guy.
And it’s cool how you get to make fun of that in the telenovela part. We even see the male characters on that becoming more aware! It’s very poignant to see the late Elizabeth Peña in the film — she was so wonderful in that part.
Edy: She was absolutely brilliant. I was amazed by what she did in every scene. We were so lucky to have her.
Georgina: She was great at drama, too, but her comic timing was impeccable.
I know I’m not necessarily part of the typical demographic that this film is aimed at, but—
Yes you are — you’re a person! What I love about the campaign they ‘re doing is that while they definitely want to bring in the telenovela lovers and Latino audiences, they also realize that this is a universal story. I hope all of my films have a broader reach.
Good, because I think this film has some really interesting things to say. I would so rather young women pay attention to what happens to Ariana and Ana Maria instead of Anastasia Steele in 50 Shades of Grey, this is such a better message.
Can we put that on the poster?
And yet you cover so many of the delicious tropes. I knew that one character on the telenovela who was supposed to be dead would show up by the end of the film!
(Laughs.) Spoiler alert! You did?
Oh, please. I think Erica Kane herself died at least five times during the course of All My Children. There’s very little that happens to Ariana that your colleague Susan Lucci didn’t go through. I remember this one storyline where she’s about to go to bed with this guy who’s been pursuing her and she suddenly says, “I can’t have sex with you, Mark. You’re my father’s bastard son!”
Edy: Oh my God, I’m literally calling Susan the second you leave and telling her that line!