Kids not only understand [a dark story] but appreciate it … Because in the real world there's fear, and dark things happen no matter how young you are. People lose parents, people lose friends … There's darkness in the world. So I think when kids are talked to in that way, they appreciate it. They're not being given some candy-coated, 'Oh, this is a world where there are no stakes.' I think that actually insults their intelligence.

Am I Latin? Am I American? What the hell am I? I love my culture and I'm very proud of my culture

Kids not only understand [a dark story] but appreciate it … Because in the real world there's fear, and dark things happen no matter how young you are. People lose parents, people lose friends … There's darkness in the world. So I think when kids are talked to in that way, they appreciate it. They're not being given some candy-coated, 'Oh, this is a world where there are no stakes.' I think that actually insults their intelligence.

Latino actors and actresses have had to struggle for decades, but when I came around with Real Women Have Curves, attitudes were starting to change. We screened the film all over the world - in Jewish communities, black communities, Greek communities, German communities - and people across the board said, "That's my family."

I hope to be acting until I'm playing the role of Grandma, and I'd like to branch out in film - producing, directing, all of it. I'll sleep when no one wants to hire me!

To me, the tragedy about this whole image-obsessed society is that young girls get so caught up in just achieving that they forget to realize that they have so much more to offer the world.

You'd never catch me dancing on tables in public. I have no desire to be known for my personal life.