Interview: Isabel Sandoval on “Lingua Franca,” ARRAY, and diversity in Hollywood
We wanted to reach out to industry professionals to gain a better understanding of how our product could create change in Hollywood. As fans of Lingua Franca, a drama about an undocumented trans Filipino woman in Brooklyn, we were so excited to speak to Isabel Sandoval.
Sandoval is a powerhouse talent — she wrote, directed, starred in, and edited the film. During our interview, she shared her experience in the film industry, how she envisions an equitable Hollywood, and professional insights we could apply to Filmify.
Read on to also learn about her distinctive aesthetic as seen in Lingua Franca and how she values being an auteur within Hollywood.
Natalie Duerr: I just rewatched Lingua Franca this morning and I was so blown away… Can you speak a bit about how Lingua Franca transformed from the first thought in your head to what we got to see?
Isabel Sandoval: Yeah. My work is not autobiographical, but it’s still very personal. By that measure, Lingua Franca definitely feels more biographical in the sense that this is the first time I’m writing and I’m also playing a character that’s quite close to me.
Olivia and I are both trans immigrants in New York City. When I started writing Lingua Franca, I was undergoing my gender transition. As I was trying to process the changes that I was experiencing, not just physically but more importantly psychologically, how I saw myself and how other people interacted with me, I started writing a fictional narrative. That later evolved to Lingua Franca.
As I was trying to process the changes that I was experiencing, not just physically but more importantly psychologically, how I saw myself and how other people interacted with me, I started writing a fictional narrative.
That later evolved to Lingua Franca.
When I first started writing, it was more of a straightforward, romantic drama in that it had nothing to do with the characters’ legal status. It’s just this Filipina trans woman who was becoming romantically involved with a cisgender man who isn’t aware that she was transgender. And so I would go about writing it in fits and starts. I would come up with one or two really striking scenes, write it down, and just leave it for a few weeks or a few months until I had fresh ideas.
But it wasn’t until Trump got elected that the final premise for Lingua Franca really came together. Especially during those first few weeks, it was like being in a daze. I was, like, going through the stages of grief. At first, I was in denial, but I was also weighed down by the sense of just anxiety, vulnerability, and paranoia about what’s going to happen. I had a few producers that I talked to and I told them, I’m not sure now is the safest time for someone like me to be making this kind of film. They said that if there’s a time to make this film, the time is now. I went back to finish the script.
I had a few producers that I talked to and I told them, I’m not sure now is the safest time for someone like me to be making this kind of film.
They said that if there’s a time to make this film, the time is now.
…The first actor that we reached out to was Lynn Cohen. And not only was she the first main actor to sign on, but she is also quite a vocal champion for the film. Her own parents were immigrants from Ukraine, as character Olga is in the film.
[The main cast] did not sign on to this as a paycheck. They read the script, and they really connected with it, in terms of how it speaks to the issues of our time.
ND: What was it like to work with ARRAY, because they ended up distributing the film?
IS: It’s truly a dream working with ARRAY, because when you think about it, in the context of the bigger marketplace, where you’re competing with the likes of the Avengers movies, Lingua Franca is a very, very niche title, but because Ava [DuVernay] and I are filmmakers with similar backgrounds — we’re both women filmmakers, persons of color — we knew how to position our films in the market. And we have an intuitive understanding of the kind of messaging that we want to put forward around the film and around me as a filmmaker.
The publicist Sharon Liggins and the team of publicists that we worked with really did an amazing job of getting the film out, and that’s why it got quite a bit of great press when the film came out. They’ve been very, very supportive. ARRAY has been truly an incredible partner and a staunch and passionate advocate for the film.
ND: Could you elaborate on the messaging that ARRAY helped you craft in order to find the right market for this film?
IS: To really position me as an auteur, which is what I wanted, and, because when you read the premise of Lingua Franca, it could sound like a boilerplate, or textbook, social issue drama, but I wanted it to feel like uniquely my film as well. That’s the kind of messaging that they wanted to focus on, and that Ava herself communicated in an hour’s Zoom call just prepping for the release of Lingua Franca. We set a PR strategy a month before the release.
Also, who did we reach out to? So we reached out to more women journalists and critics, critics of color. When you read the kind of press coverage that we have, an overwhelming majority were written by women journalists, or queer journalists, for instance.
ND: What does an equitable Hollywood look like to you? And how do you think we can get to a more equitable Hollywood?
IS: Definitely more filmmakers and decision-makers from minority communities — whether it’s persons of color, or the queer community or women — because for me, it’s really important that we have minorities in the boardrooms and not just the ones who are wanting to break into the industry. We need to have both gatekeepers and decision-makers that are actually members of our community and readily give us those opportunities.
…So that’s very important… that we have more emerging creative voices that are trying to break into the industry, but that we also have people with the power in the corporate to be able to greenlight and make projects happen that are led by, and that feature the experience of, and starring talent from these minority communities.
ND: I was reading an interview you did with Passerby and you talked about the industry wanting to put you in a box because of your identity. Do you have any advice to young diverse filmmakers who are trying to tell their stories, while also navigating not being pigeon-holed?
IS: Yeah. I’m going to speak, in particular, about my being an immigrant filmmaker and how that affects both the financial and logistical resources available for me as a filmmaker to mount my projects.
Being an immigrant filmmaker from a developing country like the Philippines actually allows me access to both potentially US money and European money, like European co-productions. The major European festivals like Berlinale, and Locarno, which is based in Switzerland, and just European countries in general, have treaties with developing countries where even if you’re a migrant in a different country or diasporic essentially, if you have your roots in that developing country, you can still access.
So that’s essentially what I’m going to be doing with my next feature, Tropical Gothic. When we were at the Berlin co-production market two weeks ago, Tropical Gothic was one of three prize-winning projects to win development funding and also stamped as an important project to watch. It’s remarkable that it won because it’s the only project out of the three winners with no attached European co-producers.
I think that speaks to what I’ve achieved being an auteur, and having really a unique sensibility and aesthetic style. And that ties into my main creative advice, to be as idiosyncratic and as bold, and as striking with your work, especially if it’s a first project that you have, because that’s really how you’re going to distinguish yourself in the industry.
When you think about it, this push for diversity and representation might just be a tokenism used by the powers that be in order to grant you supposedly a seat at the table that you rightfully deserve anyway. But what’s going to make our art sustainable for us in the long term is if we really are a distinctive voice that has something different from what others are saying.
What’s going to make our art sustainable for us in the long term is if we really are a distinctive voice that has something different from what others are saying.
That’s what I tried to do with each of my projects, from Seniorita, my first feature, to Apparition the second, and eventually to Lingua Franca. For instance, I could have made the film in a way that would have been predictable, like a little didactic or preachy or little loud or performative or angry, but I went an opposite direction, by making it quiet, subtle, poetic, and sensual, I’d like to think. And that’s why it’s connecting with people in a different way, and perhaps more deeply.
That’s what we should remember: that our quote unquote “otherness” is not something to feel diminished by or oppressed by, but it’s something that we should celebrate, and embrace, because that’s what makes us unique. And that’s what I’ve been trying to do.
Our quote unquote “otherness” is not something to feel diminished by or oppressed by, but it’s something that we should celebrate, and embrace, because that’s what makes us unique.
On Filmify, after viewing our prototype
IS: This is really, really helpful. And I would assume that [Filmify] is not only going to be a resource for viewers, but maybe even in the industry, you know, programmers, for instance. They’re looking to make sure they have a diverse selection of films. Yeah. This is really good.
ND: Thank you. We’re really excited!
You can watch Lingua Franca on Netflix, as well as two of Sandoval’s other films, Señorita and Apparition, on the Criterion Channel.
We plan to launch Filmify by April 25, 2021, the date of this year’s Academy Awards. Until then, join the waitlist on our site and stay tuned on our Medium page for weekly sneak peeks of our design and development process behind the scenes!
